Piastri snatches vital pole position off Norris with final lap in qualifying

Oscar Piastri claimed his second pole position in as many days in Losail after beating Lando Norris with his final lap in the session.

All three title contenders will start at the sharp end of the grid as Max Verstappen narrowly beat George Russell to third.

Q1

Track conditions improved quickly during the first phase of qualifying and the field was so close that those who ran near the end overwhelmingly benefited. When the chequered flag fell Verstappen in fourth place was separated from Gabriel Bortoleto in 15th by less than two tenths of a second.

That was no consolation to Yuki Tsunoda, one of the first to complete his final lap. He got within three tenths of a second of his team mate but missed the cut for Q2.

Lewis Hamilton was in a similar position. He led his team mate after their second runs but Charles Leclerc found more time at the end and secured his passage, three tenths of a second ahead of Hamilton, who was knocked out.

Three other drivers failed to join their team mates in Q2. Franco Colapinto and Esteban Ocon were among the last to set times, the Alpine driver the only person to lap more than a second slower than pace-setter George Russell. Lance Stroll also dropped out.

Russell took the top time off the two McLaren drivers with a very late final lap. Verstappen reported problems with his down-shifts as he took the fourth-fastest time.

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Q1 result

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Q2

Norris kept up his run of reaching Q3 every time this year despite a wobble in the second stage of qualifying. His first run, which was already some way off his team mate’s best, was deleted after he exceeded track limits on the way into turn 10 – a trouble spot for many drivers.

Norris gathered himself up for a final run on softs which proved good enough to ensure he reached Q3. He ended the session second behind his team mate.

Verstappen and the Mercedes drivers progressed, as did Leclerc in the sole remaining Ferrari. This was despite a significant error by Leclerc at turn six where he corrected a snap of oversteer. He ended the session safe by just a hundredth of a second from Nico Hulkenberg with Isack Hadjar between them.

Bortoleto, who has a five-place grid penalty for the race, was eliminated along with his team mate. Albon and Lawson also dropped out.

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Q2 result

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Q3

The final stage of qualifying was red-flagged after drivers completed their first runs for an unusual reason. Carlos Sainz Jnr’s Williams picked up a sticker from the garage floor as it left, which fell off the car after he joined the track. The stewards noted Williams for a potential unsafe release.

By the time the session was halted, Norris had set the fastest time with a lap of 1’19.495. Piastri came close to beating him, lapping quicker through the middle sector, but was three hundredths of a second behind at the line.

The McLaren pair had the fight for pole position to themselves. Verstappen was almost half a second slower, while Russell pipped him by a tenth of a second.

Leclerc had a dramatic moment on his first run when he lost control of his car on the exit kerb at turn 15. The Ferrari spun through 720 degrees at high speed.

Norris followed Russell out of the pits after the session restarted, but the Mercedes driver did a build lap before starting his first run. The McLaren driver got as far as turn two before having to make a major correction and backed off. “I just got a bit of understeer and was going to go off so I had to abort,” he explained afterwards.

Behind him, Piastri chipped away at his best time from sector to sector and took a tenth of a second off Norris’s time at the line. Verstappen initially looked like a threat for pole position but faded to third.

Russell didn’t improve in his first sector but ended his lap well. However it wasn’t quite enough to beat Verstappen, falling short of the Red Bull by a hundredth of a second.

His team mate Antonelli backed him up in fifth ahead of Hadjar. Sainz rebounded from his peculiar problem to take seventh ahead of Alonso, but Leclerc’s final effort wasn’t good enough to better 10th on the grid.

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Q3 result

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