Another pole in the pocket but, above all, the best result he could have hoped for today in qualifying. Max Verstappen has conquered, even in the rain of Spa, another start, another pole position with a high level lap, almost six tenths faster than the other drivers.
However, as is known, the Dutchman will not start from the first box on the starting grid due to the ten-place grid penalty that will force him to start outside the top ten. And it is precisely in this context that the “good news” arrives for the three-time world champion: in the first three positions there will not be McLaren, but Charles Leclerc, who will inherit the pole position from Verstappen, his teammate Sergio Perez and Lewis Hamilton.
Behind them will be the two McLarens, with Lando Norris in fourth place ahead of Oscar Piastri, who will inherit the fifth spot. If on dry ground a three-way duel for pole position was expected with the two McLarens and Max Verstappen, the arrival of the rain changed the cards on the table a bit, with Charles Leclerc who was able to take advantage of it, as well as Lewis Hamilton with Mercedes, who yesterday had not hidden his hope for a wet track for qualifying.
Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing, celebrates after securing Pole
Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images
Whether it was rain or dry, Verstappen’s name came out: “It was a good qualifying, luckily it was raining but only a little bit, so we managed to run in qualifying. Everything worked well, on every tyre we used we managed to do good times”.
However, there was a very interesting element during qualifying, namely the fact that in Q1 and Q2 Verstappen used only one set of intermediate tyres per heat, in order to save two for the last part of qualifying, when he would have needed them most. A tactic that worked, given that in the last heat he was able to complete two attempts, of which the first was enough for pole.
“Of course I was also thinking about Q3, not knowing if it would dry out, so I tried to keep two new sets for Q3. And luckily we managed to avoid Q1 and Q2. I’m very happy, the car worked well in the wet. I was able to do my laps and try to do clean laps in the wet, which is always quite difficult,” added the three-time world champion.
Clearly, starting eleventh, Verstappen’s hope was that the two McLarens would fail to get onto the front row, and then be forced to at least overtake some other rivals in the race to get back into the lead. Furthermore, tomorrow should present a totally different challenge to today, not only because of the dry track, but also because of the temperatures, which are warmer than those recorded today. On Friday, the teams encountered two elements: graining and quite marked degradation, which will most likely push the teams to consider the hard compound.
Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB20
Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Images
“I know tomorrow will be a very different day: it will be warmer, normally it won’t rain. So, it all depends on the tyre degradation and we just need to make sure we are OK. I know I also have to start 10 positions back, so this was the best I could do today. And then go from there. I don’t know how fast we will be.”
“I hope we can be in the group to try to move forward. The race can be lost in Turn 1. So, we just have to see what happens. It’s a very long race, very hard on the tyres. We just have to try to manage them as best we can and hope to be competitive tomorrow,” added Max, who with a view to the race also decided to go back to the more loaded wing that he had tried in FP1 without cutting the flap of the mobile wing, which should guarantee a little more in terms of tyre management over the long distance.
“We are not making it easy for ourselves and especially for the battle we are in. I know that, yes, today was a great day, but in the wet. Tomorrow we need to be fast in the dry. But, yes, it will be a tough battle. We will try to do our best. Hopefully we can fight with the Ferraris and Mercedes. And, if we have a bit of luck, maybe we can challenge the McLarens.”
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