Max Verstappen is about to win his third world championship in Formula 1. The Dutchman can clear the title in the sprint tomorrow, Saturday, so his pole position in today’s qualifying could no longer be of any help. Because if he lines up first on the starting grid on Sunday, he could already be world champion.
But the Red Bull driver is of course happy to take first place in qualifying in Qatar. Verstappen once again won this quite confidently: in the end he was 0.441 seconds ahead of second-placed George Russell (Mercedes), who benefited from a canceled lap by Lando Norris.
Verstappen also fell victim to a track limit violation and then aborted his second Q3 run. But by then he had already achieved a lap that was sufficient for pole position.
“Fortunately, the first run was such a mega lap,” enthuses Red Bull team boss Christian Horner on “Sky” and says that the first sector in particular was the key. “In the first corner alone he pulled the others’ teeth,” he says. After that, he was almost two tenths of a second ahead of the competition.
“With the new asphalt there wasn’t much grip”
Verstappen needed 30.791 seconds for the first sector – clear best time. Because only the two McLarens were able to stay under 31 seconds in this section – but only by a tiny margin and on a lap that was canceled.
“My first Q3 run was good. I was happy with the balance of the car considering the conditions,” says Verstappen. Because, according to him, they were difficult for everyone.
“With the new asphalt there wasn’t much grip. And as soon as you wanted to take a little more speed into the corner, the rear broke out,” he says. “And that made it very difficult to find the limit in qualifying run after run. Because you want to see how much the track improves, but you can’t overdo it.”
Verstappen error in turn 4
But then he did that in his second run. “He then tried to get a little more out of it in the next lap,” says Horner. But Verstappen made a mistake and got too far out in Turn 4, so he had to abort his lap.
“I just tried to take a little more speed into the corner and I couldn’t hold it,” says the world champion. “I knew I already had a good lap, so I tried to push a little more and throw everything into it. But the asphalt doesn’t let you push that little bit more.”
“As soon as you overdo it a little, the car will stall. You can’t correct it. That’s a shame, but not a big problem.”
He doesn’t know whether he would have improved his time again. “I only got to turn 4,” he shrugs. But he assumes so because the track got faster and faster with every run.
This was also a difficulty for him before the session. Because the drivers only had one training session to prepare for qualifying. And because it took place in the daylight, qualifying was a bit of a mystery for everyone.
“The training was okay, but it was just about fine-tuning a few things and seeing what the track did. I had no idea how much it would improve,” says Verstappen.
“He wants to win both races”
Red Bull’s motorsport consultant Helmut Marko tells “Sky” that Red Bull made a few changes to the car after training, but that they were “not massive”. “Here the window in which the whole thing moves is relatively small,” he says. “But it worked perfectly.”
Although Verstappen complained that his car felt a bit unstable due to the changing wind conditions, it was still enough for him to take confident pole.
And he could take it on Sunday as a three-time world champion if he gets three points on Saturday. According to Marko, the Dutchman is “very relaxed” about this.
“I think the World Cup title can’t be prevented and he’s going about it as usual,” said the Austrian. “He wants to win both races. And I think that’s the right approach even after this season.”