Lando Norris will start alongside Kimi Antonelli for the inaugural Spanish Grand Prix in Madrid after an outstanding pole lap.
Before the session started, we got the news that Oliver Bearman would not take part due to his crash in FP3. The team was unable to fix the car in time; he will start from the back. Lance Stroll also did not take part and will start from the pit lane.
Q1
Qualifying at the Madring began with Max Verstappen and the Ferraris opting for the Medium tyres.
Kimi Antonelli was the first of the drivers to set a lap time around the new circuit, a 1:33.316. Gabriel Bortoleto set a great lap time, putting his Audi car into 3rd, only 4 tenths off Antonelli’s time.
Liam Lawson then shot up the leaderboard with a 1:33.316 to take first place. On the other hand, the Racing Bulls team was struggling for pace.
Both Mercedes drivers had some challenging laps, despite their competitive speed. George Russell tapped the wall, and Kimi Antonelli locked up into Turn 17.
However, George came back out and put himself in first at the end of Q1 with a 1:33.211. Disappointment for the Spanish crowd, as both Sainz and Alonso didn’t make it out of the bottom six.
OUT in Q1 were: Sainz, Alonso, Perez, Bottas, Bearman and Stroll.
Q2
Lights turned green at the end of the pit lane for the second part of qualifying. Briefly, the yellow flags came out at Turn 12 for Franco Colapinto, who had a close call and nearly lost the car in the corner.
49% of drivers’ time is spent in the corners here at the Madring. Mercedes and Red Bull seemed to have the car to work well on this track, as Verstappen set the best time in Q2.
Pierre Gasly felt his car was completely different to how it felt in Free Practice 3 earlier in the day. He found himself not progressing any further.
OUT in Q2: Hulkenberg, Bortoleto, Ocon, Gasly, Tsunoda and Albon.
Q3: Pole time
George Russell will be investigated after the session for not following the Race Director’s instructions. But he wasn’t the only one getting in trouble. Lando Norris received a black and white flag for the same thing.
Provisional pole was set by Lewis Hamilton, as the Ferraris seemed to find time in Q3. A 1:32.079 was the time to beat heading into the final minutes of the first qualifying at the Madring.
Red Bull looked as though they couldn’t keep up with Mercedes and Ferrari. But no one expected Lando Norris to snatch pole position away in his McLaren car.
The Brit came through with a stonking 1:31.824, beating Antonelli to the front grid slot by 0.011 seconds.
After watching the racing action of the previous F2 and F3 sprint races, drivers observed that qualifying was extremely important. So, it made sense that Lando had a big smile on his face for this one.
Here is how the provisional Top 10 looks for tomorrow’s race:
- Lando Norris
- Kimi Antonelli
- Max Verstappen
- Lewis Hamilton
- Charles Leclerc
- George Russell
- Oscar Piastri
- Liam Lawson
- Franco Colapinto
- Arvid Lindblad
Lights out for the first race around the Madring starts at 15:00 local time.