It was an all-around bizarre qualifying in Mexico City, but Ferrari’s Formula 1 team certainly won’t complain.
The Prancing Horse locked out the front row during Saturday’s qualifying session, with driver Charles Leclerc coming across the line fastest and his teammate Carlos Sainz following suit. Red Bull driver and current F1 champion Max Verstappen finished third initially, but he and Mercedes drivers Lewis Hamilton and George Russell are under investigation for holding up the pit lane on exit.
Aside from those investigations, there were a number of strange incidents and happenings in this session. McLaren’s Lando Norris had a strategy mishap on this tires and Q1 and qualified 19th after Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso spun out toward the end of the session, causing a yellow flag that slowed him down. AlphaTauri’s Daniel Ricciardo put in a phenomenal performance, finishing fourth (at time of writing) in Q3. Williams’ Alexander Albon also had a lap time deleted for track limits in Q2, which prevented him from moving on and placing higher.
Here’s what the qualifying order looks like at the moment, pending investigation:
- Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) [1:17.166]
- Carlos Sainz (Ferrari) [1:17.233]
- Max Verstappen (Red Bull) [1:17.263]
- Daniel Ricciardo (AlphaTauri) [1:17.382]
- Sergio Perez (Red Bull) [1:17.423]
- Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes) [1:17.454]
- Oscar Piastri (McLaren) [1:17.623]
- George Russell (Mercedes) [1:17.674]
- Valtteri Bottas (Alfa Romeo) [1:18.032]
- Zhou Guanyu (Alfa Romeo) [1:18.050]
- Pierre Gasly (Alpine) [1:18.521]
- Nico Hulkenberg (Haas) [1:18.524]
- Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin) [1:18.738]
- Alexander Albon (Williams) [1:19.147]
- Yuki Tsunoda (AlphaTauri) [1:18.890] *Did not run in Q2
- Esteban Ocon (Alpine) [1:19.080]
- Kevin Magnussen (Haas) [1:19.163]
- Lance Stroll (Aston Martin) [1:19.227]
- Lando Norris (McLaren) [1:21.554]
- Logan Sargeant (Williams) [No Time]