EMILIA-ROMAGNA GP – Charles Leclerc takes pole for the sprint by just under eight tenths ahead of Max Verstappen
Max Verstappen has beaten Charles Leclerc to take pole position and start the sprint at the front for this weekend’s Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix. The world champion put his Red Bull just under eight-tenths of a second in a heavily interrupted wet qualifying session at Imola.
The Dutchman set his fastest time at the end of the incident-packed two hour-long sessions which say five red flags for crashes and failures. Verstappen looked once again in control the stronger car in the wet when he edged ahead of Leclerc just before the final red flag caused by the McLaren of Lando Norris who crashed in the dying moments of Q3.
Tomorrow’s sprint is set to put Verstappen and Leclerc head to head once again as they share the front row for the fourth time this season, with them being the favourites for the twenty one lap sprit which will set the grid for the race on Sunday. Following his retirements in Sakhir and Melbourne, offers the opportunity to recover points in the drivers’ championship
Norris has been trying to get closer and try to spilt Leclerc and Verstappen, but the Englishman didn’t look close before crashing at Acque Minerali causing the session to stop forty seconds before the chequered flag.
The Englishman says he was “surprised” by McLaren’s best performance of the season, with his crash preventing other drivers from improving and allowing Kevin Magnussen to take fourth the Danish drivers best result of his career.
Norris said, “When people have less time to get up to speed, that’s when we look better. Shocked. When you have to deliver as a driver, that’s when we manage to do it. The car is good enough that it gives me the confidence to do that, so I’m happy.”
Q3 had already been stopped with three minutes to go when the Alfa Romeo of Valtteri Bottas stopped heading towards the first Rivazza.
Verstappen, who retired from two of the first three races of the season, said, “It was tricky out there with the dry/rain. It was very slippery. It was hectic, a long qualifying but of course in the end happy to be here. It is an amazing track and it really punishes you if you make a mistake.”
Haas appeared to return to early-season form following the difficult weekend in Melbourne, Magnussen going fourth fastest ahead of Fernando Alonso. Magnussen taking the best start for Haas in tomorrow’s twenty-one lap sprint, with the two-time champion being caught out by the conditions with five minutes to go.
Daniel Ricciardo put his McLaren sixth going six hundredths ahead of Sergio Perez, they start ahead of Bottas and Sebastian Vettel. Vettel was slowest in Q3 after the second Ferrari of Carlos Sainz was unable to take part after crashing early on Q2, but his time was still good enough to see him through to the top-ten shootout.
Sainz has through out the season, and in first practice looked to be able to fight both Leclerc and Verstappen. Again another mistake in the second part of the session cost him any hope of challenge for pole position.
George Russell was fastest of those knocked out in Q2, the Mercedes drivers were caught out by the timing of Sainz’s crash. When the session resumed the conditions had changed leaving them unable to improve, resulting in the team’s first double Q2 knockout since Suzuka 2012.
But the truth was the German Manufacturer was struggling in practice and the drivers were struggling to unlock performance and with porpoising, meaning it was unlikely they were going to get through.
Lewis Hamilton was thirteenth three tenths behind Russell but says he felt the team had “underperformed” but it is clear Mercedes need to get to the bottom of what is causing the car’s problems quickly if this season is not to be a total write-off. He had only scraped his way through Q1 by four thousandths of a second and Russell not that much further ahead.
The seven-time champion said “I think we underperformed as a team today. There are things that we should have done that we didn’t do. Each weekend is a rescue.”
Mick Schumacher managed to spilt the two Mercedes going two tenths faster than Hamilton. The Englishman had struggled throughout FP1 and qualifying to generate heat into his tyres and that carried on into qualifying.
Guanyu Zhou was another driver to be caught out in the changing conditions, he had looked good in Q1 going fourth, but was unable to replicate that in Q2 leaving him fourteenth. Lance Stroll didn’t go out again following the final part of Q2 although Vettel did which saw him make it through to Q3.
Both Alpha Tauri’s failed to make it out of Q1 for their home race with Yuki Tsunoda going three and a half tenths faster than teammate Pierre Gasly. The teams worst qualifying at Imola since 2006, when they raced under the name Toro Rosso, not what they would have expected proving competitive at the last two races at the circuit.
Nicolas Latifi put his Williams eighteenth four tenths ahead of Esteban Ocon, the second Williams of Alex Albon failed to set a time. Albon’s session end through no fault of his own, after complaining of losing his brake pedal altogether as he was captured crawling around with flames shooting out of the right-rear brake duct.
This was swiftly followed by a small explosion inside the assembly – likely to be the brake disc failing as it subsequently tore chunks out of the suspension to drop debris on track. He then stopped on track bringing out the red flag.
Latifi meanwhile once the session resumed spun bring out the yellow flag, however he managed to recover his car avoiding the need for a red flag. But the yellow flag prevented Tsunoda from improving enough to get through to Q2, although he did move ahead of teammate Gasly by a quarter of second.
Esteban Ocon only did one lap in the session, the Alpine driver hobbling around to complete a lap despite a gearshift issue to go ahead of Albon.