Max Verstappen says he touched a few walls pushing harder than ever in the final sector to overturn a 0.2s deficit to take pole position at the Monaco Grand Prix.
Fernando Alonso was on provisional pole and Verstappen was 0.2s down entering the Swimming Pool section, with just the 19s final sector to go. Despite looking like he would miss out on the front row, Verstappen pulled out his fastest sector to take pole by just under 0.1s, and admits he took more risks than ever to leapfrog Alonso, Charles Leclerc and Esteban Ocon.
“Touched a few walls!” Verstappen said of what he did differently on his final run. “I was always quite quick in the last sector, but I definitely pushed a bit harder in the last lap.
“I’m just happy to get my first pole here. It’s always super hectic, and finally we also had…clean running in Q3 as well, so that was nice for everyone to just push to the limit.
“The whole qualifying I think went pretty well. I struggled a bit to put it in the first lap with (warming up) the tires and putting it all together, all the sectors. But I knew that the last lap, I had to do it because they improved. And I also knew that going into the last sector I was down on them, so I had to push flat out in the last sector, risk everything to get back the lap time. And luckily we did.”
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The dramatic session saw three other teams — Aston Martin, Ferrari and Alpine — threaten Verstappen for pole position, but he says it wasn’t a surprise as Monaco doesn’t suit Red Bull’s car.
“Not really. I knew that going into this weekend, it was going to be tight around here. It’s proven that in qualifying,” he said.
“The race should be OK. It’s just about having a clean start. There’s always chaos involved in Monaco, but I think our race pace and general behavior of the car on the tires is fine. But it was all about just putting that together over one lap, which I knew was going to be a little bit harder for us here in Monaco, just with how our car is, the characteristics of it. Still, to be first here is great for the whole team.”
Even less surprising to Verstappen was the fact Alonso was his closest challenger, with the Spaniard coming close to his first pole position since 2012.
“For me, it’s nothing of a surprise. I grew up watching Fernando in F1 and I liked his style, and for him to still be here at 41, it’s very impressive and a great example for people out there. If you stay committed and believe in yourself, believe in the opportunities that come to you, then you can show something like he’s doing right now. But you need also a lot of natural raw talent with that.”
