Max Verstappen dominated the fight for pole position at the Spanish Grand Prix after Sergio Perez, Charles Leclerc and George Russell all failed to make it through to Q3.
Verstappen has been peerless all weekend at a circuit that has accentuated his Red Bull Racing car’s strongest qualities. The Dutchman was so good in qualifying that he didn’t bother to complete his final flying lap despite setting a purple middle sector. He still ended the day with a half-second advantage. After the first runs he had been 0.924s ahead of the pack.
“The car was really good,” he said after clocking 1m 12.272s for pole. “The car was on rails and was really enjoyable to drive today.
“I love coming to Barcelona in general. I love the track … I have a lot of great memories here, and hopefully tomorrow we can add another one.”
Sainz emerged as the next-best driver, albeit he was still 0.462s off pole. The Ferrari driver said he’d done his maximum to beat his upper-midfield rivals, with the top eight behind Verstappen split by just 0.495s.
“Today I felt like I was driving very well,” he said. “It’s always one tenth here, one tenth there, but I was pushing everything.
“I didn’t leave anything on the table today. I was pushing flat out.”
[lawrence-auto-related count=3 category=1388]
Lando Norris was a shock third for McLaren, the Briton just 0.058s slower than Sainz ahead of him.
“I’m surprised to be here,” he said. “Amazing job. P3, almost P2. It was nice. The whole qualifying we were quick.”
Pierre Gasly was fourth for Alpine, pipping Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton by just 0.002s.
Lance Stroll was sixth, beating Aston Martin teammate Fernando Alonso in qualifying for the first time this season after the Spaniard made a mistake at Turn 10 on his way to ninth on the grid.
Between them slotted Esteban Ocon and an excellent Nico Hulkenberg in seventh and eighth, while Oscar Piastri completed the top 10 after finding only 0.1s with his final lap.
Q1 and Q2 were full of surprises, with a slippery track from afternoon showers making conditions tricky for drivers.
Leclerc, the 2022 Spanish Grand Prix polesitter, became the circuit’s first of three major scalps when he was eliminated in 19th after suffering problems with his rear axle. The Monegasque complained that “something is wrong with my rears” after his first flying lap, and his final attempt was delayed by a call to the weighbridge.
He was able to get back out for a last-gasp lap, but there wasn’t time to diagnose the problem, Leclerc’s final lap lacked 0.205s to Q2, and he dropped to 19th at the end of the segment.
Perez had come perilously close to being knocked out in the same session when he scraped through to Q2 in 15th, but he would go no further after a scruffy second segment. He wasn’t fast enough with his first run and ran wide and through the gravel at Turn 5 with his second flying lap, and his final attempt wasn’t fast enough to make the top 10. He qualified 11th, missing out on a Q3 berth by 0.051s.
Russell was then eliminated in 12th in bizarre fashion after crashing with teammate Hamilton. Both cars met partway down the front straight on fast laps when the younger Briton appeared to push his older compatriot towards the left-hand barrier in a clumsy attempt to avoid Carlos Sainz travelling slowly on his right-hand side.
Hamilton lost a front-wing endplate but already had a time good enough for Q3, but Russell couldn’t string together a fast enough lap after the contact to make it through, leaving him 12th.
Zhou Guanyu was an impressive 13th ahead of AlphaTauri teammates Nyck de Vries and Yuki Tsunoda.
Valtteri Bottas will start 16th ahead of Kevin Magnussen and Alex Albon.
The dejected Leclerc will line up 19th ahead of only American rookie Logan Sargeant, who was more than 0.6s off the back of the pack in his Williams.
