Austrian Grand Prix: Max Verstappen storms to Sprint pole as Mercedes suffer NIGHTMARE session

Verstappen, Austrian GP, Sprint Shootout — Photo: © LAT Images

Austrian Grand Prix

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Verstappen storms to Sprint pole as Mercedes suffer NIGHTMARE session

Max Verstappen will start Saturday's Sprint race on pole position and is joined on the front row by Sergio Perez

Dan McCarthy

Saturday 1 July 2023 13:48

Max Verstappen will start on pole position for the Sprint race in Austria after yet another peerless drive at the Red Bull Ring.

The defending champion set a lap time of 1:04.440sec, nearly half a second ahead of team-mate Sergio Perez in second, who will feel much better following a miserable Friday qualifying session for the Grand Prix.

Lando Norris put in a storming lap to qualify third while Nico Hulkenberg showed great one-lap pace yet again after Canada as he starts fourth, ahead of an all-Ferrari row three of Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc.

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Lewis Hamilton had a session to forget and will begin 18th after falling foul of the dreaded track limit rules, while team-mate George Russell will begin 15th following hydraulic issues after SQ1.

SQ1

The big news from the first mini-session was that Hamilton will start the sprint race 18th after having a lap time deleted for exceeding track limits.

His last lap saw him stuck in traffic around turn four and he could not record a sufficiently quick enough time, bemoaning the "bad timing" down the team radio.

Speaking after, he was philosophical, admitting the Sprint race "doesn't really matter" and hopes to "have some fun at the back".

Lewis Hamilton exceeded track limits in the final sector

Williams' Logan Sargeant suffered the same fate and his lap time deletion sees him start plum last with Valtteri Bottas 19th.

Oscar Piastri qualified 17th, though the McLaren man felt he was impeded by Charles Leclerc's Ferrari heading into turn nine where cars enter the pit lane, while Alfa Romeo had a session to forget as Zhou Guanyu finished 16th.

Carlos Sainz recorded the fastest time in his only lap after reporting brake problems at the start of the session.

SQ2

By this point, the track was drying out and lap times were improving. All drivers opted to start the session on soft tyres.

Mercedes' horror afternoon session continued as Russell could not set a lap time due to hydraulic issues. The team were working on fixing the steering rack ahead of the sprint race this afternoon.

Nyck De Vries will have been pleased to get through to SQ2 due to the pressure on his shoulders at AlphaTauri but he had to settle for 14th after having a lap deleted.

Team-mate Yuki Tsunoda lines up 13th with Pierre Gasly and Alex Albon 12th and 11th respectively, just missing out reaching the third session.

For the second session running, Leclerc diced with danger as he looked to be out but he set a quick enough time near the end.

SQ3

There was a tiny concern for Verstappen at the beginning of SQ3 as his car let out a big cloud of black smoke in the pits waiting for the green light but that was about as stressful as the session got.

The Dutchman was once again in a class of his own and the session essentially ended up being a battle for second with no issues affecting the Red Bull man.

Perez put in a solid lap time to end the session second, meaning Red Bull lock out the front row in Austria for the first time.

Perez will be feeling much better after big criticism from team boss Christian Horner on Friday

He was just ahead of Norris in third while Hulkenberg set a fabulous lap time in fourth, considering he was running on the medium tyres.

Sainz and Leclerc are fifth and sixth with the latter struggling to extract the maximum amount of pace from the Scuderia car.

The Aston Martins are on row four with Fernando Alonso ahead of Lance Stroll, while Esteban Ocon and Kevin Magnussen round out the top ten as Haas can take big encouragement from both their drivers making it to the third session.

Team boss Guenther Steiner was in good spirits, joking that Sky F1 commentator David Croft was the good luck charm after speaking to the broadcast from the pit wall.