Max Verstappen says he found himself with degraded tyres in the last sector on his final hot lap in Saturday’s qualifying, which thwarted his efforts to claim pole for the Mexican Grand Prix.
Verstappen clocked in third at the end of Q3 behind the leading Ferrari duo of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz, the Red Bull driver failing to overhaul his rivals by just 0.097s.
The Dutchman had led the charge in the earlier segments of the session and all signs pointed to a 31st career pole in F1 at the end of the day.
But all the elements fell in place at just the right time for Leclerc and Sainz who unexpectedly locked out the front row for Sunday’s race at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez.
Had the Italian outfit’s standout performance come as a surprise to Verstappen?
“I mean, it’s always difficult to tell, you know? I’m not part of their team, so I don’t know what’s going on,” commented the three-time world champion.
“I personally just expected it to be a little bit better in evolution through qualifying from our side. And I think that’s what we were lacking a little bit.
“I think Q1 was okay, Q2 wasn’t too bad but then it just seemed to like, fall away from us, like the improvements were not big enough, coming into Q3.”
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Verstappen suggested that the track’s low-grip profile had led to his tyre difficulties in the final sector of his lap.
“This track is also extremely difficult in qualifying, to basically almost, let’s say, hit the perfect lap,” he added.
“Because it’s so low grip, if you tried to push a little bit more, you might overheat the tyres, or you have a little slide.
“And that’s, I think, what happened to me today, where I tried to find a little bit more time, but then the balance wasn’t exactly there.
“And then you’re sliding, you overheat your tyres, and then in the last sector, you have no tyres left. And that’s basically a bit I think what happened.
“Yeah, it’s just this track is very, very difficult to put a perfect lap together.”
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At one point during his final flyer, Verstappen appeared to be on course to outpace his Ferrari rivals having set the fastest time in the second sector. But pushing ultimately proved costly.
“I still felt quite bad in the middle sector! I was sliding around quite a bit,” he added. “So again, yeah, I mean, I tried to get a bit of time back. My first sector wasn’t probably ideal. I mean, I improved a bit but not enough.
“But yeah, it’s just feeling, and then around here, when you slide a bit too much, like I said, it doesn’t come together. And yeah, when it’s so tight, you know one or two-tenths can be easily found or lost and I think that’s what happened in qualifying.”
However, despite his qualifying shortfall, Verstappen’s confidence in sealing his 51st career win in F1 in Mexico City is intact.
“I also have two Hard tyres. So, nobody else has them, really around me,” he noted. “So that’s also maybe an advantage for tomorrow. But yeah, again, I mean, a lot can happen into Turn 1 already.”
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