Everything was looking good on Friday as far as Max Verstappen, after the Red Bull driver secured pole position for Sunday's Qatar Grand Prix by almost half a second over his Mercedes rivals George Russell and Lewis Hamilton.
It's the perfect place for him to be in to secure his third consecutive drivers championship this weekend - and he could wrap things up even before the race gets underway if tomorrow's sprint goes his way.
“I’m very happy to be on pole," he said afterwards. "I think we can all be happy with the performance of the car today.
"I think we made the right calls after FP1," he commented. "The tarmac was quite slippery so I was really having to build up lap after lap, but I think we were in a good window and we were improving quite nicely through each run."
But in a session that saw mistakes by many drivers, not even Verstappen emerged the day without an error. Fortunately it came on his final run of the day when things were already wrapped up.
For Max the first run [in Q3] was such a strong lap he nailed it in the first sector, if not the first corner,' commented Red Bull team principal Christian Horner.
"He then tried to take a little bit more out on the next lap and made a mistake, but with that banker it was enough today to see him through."
As well as being successful in today's qualifying session, taking pole should also give him an edge on Saturday when the Sprint Showdown sets the grid for the evening's sprint tace.
"Tomorrow will be interesting, with the different session times and temperatures, but let’s see what we can do," he said.
But not everyone was happy with how things had gone in qualifying, with another disappointing result for Verstappen's team mate Sergio Perez who missed the cut at the end of Q2 and will start Sunday's race from 13th on the grid.
“It was quite difficult out there today, we struggled for balance a lot and we had so many issues that I couldn’t really fix any of them. Every corner was different and the conditions here made it tricky," he said.
Perez is the only driver mathematically capable of stopping verstappen retaining the championship, so another poor qualifying is the last thing he wanted this weekend.
It's the eighth time in 17 races so far in 2023 that the Mexican has failed to reach the final round of qualifying and start in the top ten. He went five successive races outside the top five rows between Monaco and Silverstone.
"It is not over," Perez insisted. "It's obviously going to be very difficult to pass in the race here, especially with the track conditions we currently have but we will see what we are able to do and recover from there on Sunday.
"Tomorrow is a new day and we have the chance to put in a better performance across the sprint format.”
"A session of exceeded track limits for many drivers today, not least Checo," observed Horner. "He drove well and was through to Q3, but then unfortunately removed from Q3 after having his lap time deleted.
"It has been a challenge but it has been the same for everyone," he continued. "The circuit is evolving quickly and of course the teams have only had one session to sort the cars out.
"But now the set ups are locked in for the rest of the weekend," he added. "We have had a very strong race car all year and I would expect a strong race car again on both Saturday evening [for the sprint] and Sunday evening [for the GP]."
Verstappen can clinch the title on Saturday if he finishes in sixth place or better in the sprint, regardless of what Perez does.
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