Oscar Piastri took a crucial pole position for the Qatar Grand Prix, beating Lando Norris in second and Max Verstappen in third.
Norris’s first run in Q3 started with an excellent first sector, and although Piastri fought back in the remaining two, he was just 0.035 seconds behind his teammate’s time. Verstappen was almost half a second behind, but there was drama elsewhere when Charles Leclerc suffered a huge spin out of Turn 15 – a moment that had been coming all weekend given the Ferrari’s handling problems – and Carlos Sainz was the cause of a bizarre red flag.
Williams released Sainz’s car from the garage and as he entered the pit lane, his rear tires pulled the stickers from the garage floor and wrapped them around the rubber. After three corners the stickers came off, but once the first runs were over the sessions were halted to remove debris from the track.
When running resumed, Norris went wide at Turn 2 and had to abort his lap, leaving the door open for Piastri to put it all together and take pole position by 0.108 seconds. Given the difficulty of overtaking in Qatar, it is a crucial result, with a win for Norris being enough to give him the title on Sunday.
Verstappen occasionally struggled with the pace, but drove a strong final lap to secure third place on the grid, a quarter of a second behind Piastri. The Dutchman, 25 points behind, must beat Norris on Sunday to stay in the title race, while Piastri is 22 points behind his teammate.
The Mercedes duo George Russell and Kimi Antonelli start from fourth and fifth place, ahead of Isack Hadjar, Sainz, Fernando Alonso and Leclerc.
The battle to reach Q3 itself proved extremely tight, with Leclerc getting through by just 0.010 seconds – still enough for ninth place in the second part of qualifying. Hadjar’s P10 lap in Q2 was just 0.003 seconds faster than Nico Hulkenberg, who dropped out in 11th place, ahead of Liam Lawson and Ollie Bearman. Six cars were lapped with a time difference of 0.114 seconds either side of the boundary line, led by Gasly in eighth place.
Gabriel Bortoleto reached Q2 by just over 0.1 seconds, but after qualifying fourteenth he will start from nineteenth position due to a five-place grid penalty for causing a collision at the start of the Las Vegas Grand Prix last weekend. Alex Albon – who will be investigated after the session for a possible pit lane violation – will start from fourteenth as a result of Bortoleto’s penalty.
The first part of qualifying had a number of off-track moments for several drivers, with Turn 15 – the penultimate corner – being particularly difficult. Some laps were canceled, including one for Gasly – his for exceeding the track limits at Turn 8 – causing him to lose his fastest time but still be able to continue.
Alpine’s Gasly dropped to 15th and was still able to continue in the session, showing the extent of Ferrari’s problems as Lewis Hamilton made his third successive exit in the first part of qualifying. Hamilton was faster than teammate Leclerc on the first run on new tires in Q1, but did not take advantage of it on his final attempt and finished 18th overall.
The gap between Hamilton and Leclerc at that point was 0.343 seconds, and it was a similar margin – 0.289 seconds – between Yuki Tsunoda and Verstappen in Q1. While Tsunoda outsmarted Verstappen in sprint qualifying, this time the Japanese driver was 16th fastest and was eliminated early.
Esteban Ocon finished 17th, Lance Stroll 19th and Franco Colapinto 20th – all eliminated in Q1.
RESULTS
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