Newly-crowned four-time world champion Max Verstappen has been stripped of pole position at the Qatar Grand Prix for impeding Mercedes driver George Russell in qualifying on Saturday. Red Bull’s Verstappen was given a one-place grid penalty for blocking Russell with the British driver starting on pole instead of the Dutchman. Hours after Verstappen claimed his first pole position for five months a one-place penalty was imposed for driving unnecessarily slowly, a manouevre that pushed Russell into the gravel. The Red Bull driver clocked the fastest lap in one minute and 20.520 seconds and Russell was originally second for Mercedes just 0.055 seconds adrift.
But the British driver cried foul immediately.
“Super-dangerous by Verstappen,” said the Mercedes driver, whose thoughts prompted the stewards to investigate.
“I ended up going through the gravel and all over the floor it felt like it was scraping,” said Russell.
McLaren’s Lando Norris remains third while sprint-race winner Oscar Piastri of McLaren was fourth with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc on the third row along with Lewis Hamilton in sixth for Sunday’s Grand Prix.
Norris admitted his disappointment at missing out on a front row start.
“It’s not what we hoped for, but it was the maximum we could do. My lap was pretty good, but not quick enough.”
Hamilton, set for Ferrari next year, finished sixth, admitting: “I don’t really care. I just want to get through these races, do my job, turn up and look forward to the winter break.”
After the early laps, Verstappen led before Russell went top in 1:21.519, a time that was seven-tenths quicker than Hamilton’s best as he struggled to extract matching pace on his way to ninth.
With four minutes to go, Russell offered Hamilton a tow which lifted him to sixth, 0.118 off the pace in a tight field before Russell trimmed two-tenths off his best lap in 1:21.241, beating Leclerc by 0.037 with Sainz third ahead of Norris.
Out went Alex Albon and his Williams team-mate Franco Colapinto along with Liam Lawson of RB, Haas’s Nico Hulkenberg and Alpine’s Esteban Ocon.
Russell began Q3 in the same style, clocking 1:21.161, but his top spot was quickly taken by Verstappen in 1:21.085, Red Bull’s set-up changes, following the sprint, paying dividends.
On his second run, Russell improved to go top again by 0.001 seconds, but it was not enough in improving conditions to resist a revitalised Verstappen, or Norris, who clocked 1:20.983.
It looked solid for McLaren, but in a final flurry of laps Verstappen went top in 1:20.687 with Hamilton rising to fifth, within 0.026 of Russell in fourth, and Alonso and Magnussen claiming top ten spots.
The ‘top 10 shootout’ began with Russell topping the pile in 1:20.575 ahead of Leclerc on their opening runs when Norris ran off at Turn Five and failed to clock a time before Verstappen slotted into second.
This left McLaren in need of a strong late lap in the final seconds as they all ran again and Verstappen, against his own forecasts, finished ahead of Russell and Norris for what looked like his first pole since the Austrian Grand Prix in June.
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