Red Bull driver Max Verstappen snatched a late pole for the 2024 United States sprint race in Friday's qualifying session at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas.
George Russell had hoped an early run had given him the edge but the Mercedes driver ended up 0.012s short of the top spot. The second row will be taken up by Ferrari's Charles Leclerc and McLaren's Lando Norris.
Sergio Perez was bumped out of the final round and the Red Bull driver will instead start tomorrow's 19-lap sprint from P11. There was even worse news for Oscar Piastri, with the McLaren demoted to P16 after his first round lap time was deleted.
Just a few hours after hitting the track for the single practice session of the weekend, it was already time to get serious with qualifying for this weekend's sprint race at The Circuit of the Americas. Since the end of FP1 things had got rather more overcast and cooler in Austin, with the wind picking up and even a few drops of rain detectable in the air.
Most cars made a quick start to the session, although Mercedes and Aston Martin both opted to hold back initially. By contrast, Max Verstappen was one of the first to set a time of 1:34.698s which was a tenth quicker than his Red Bull team mate Sergio Perez, whose time was promptly deleted for exceeding track limits. Neither time was particularly strong, and Kevin Magnussen soon took over at the top for Haas ahead of RB's Yuki Tsunoda.
They were hustled to one side in turn by flying laps from Charles Leclerc, Lando Norris and Carlos Sainz, before Lewis Hamilton went top for Mercedes a half a tenth faster still. With four minutes to go, Esteban Ocon, Nico Hulkenberg, Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu were in the drop zone along with Perez who had yet to set a replacement for his deleted lap. When he did so, he shot up to safety in P7 at the same time that Verstappen improved to P3 ahead of Norris and Sainz.
Attention then turned to the bottom spots to see who was going to miss the cut. Albon pushed too hard and went for a spin on his final run as the chequered flag came out. Oscar Piastri also went astray at turn 19 and had his lap time deleted as a consequence leaving him in the drop zone as well, along with Esteban Ocon, Albon, Bottas and Zhou.
"Obviously a disappointing start to Sprint Qualifying," acknowledged McLaren CEO Zak Brown after Piastri's early exit. "The car has plenty of speed but the Ferraris look tough to beat. [Our] drivers aren't totally happy with the balance of the race car."
In no time at all, the cars were back in business for the second round of sprint qualifying. Hamilton took up an early residency in provisional P1 ahead of his Mercedes team mate Russell with Norris third, while this time Verstappen held back in order to have the option to run two quick-fire runs in rapid succession.
Instead it was Ferrari's turn to take a shot at the top, and Sainz claimed the early honours by a tenth while Leclerc was just 0.022s behind Hamilton in third. Then it was Verstappen's opportunity to make his run and he went second, just 0.016 slower than Sainz meaning the top three were all covered by less then a tenth.
Leclerc was best of the rest and Russell, Norris, Magnussen, Colapinto and Hulkenberg also safely made the cut. Perez had been left on the bubble in tenth with no time to make another run, only to be ejected from making it through to the final round by a last-minute flier from Tsunoda.
There were lap time deletions for Lance Stroll, Fernando Alonso and Liam Lawson meaning they failed to make the cut along with Perez. The fifth and final elimination spot was taken by Alpine's Pierre Gasly.
It was another quick turnaround before the final round of sprint qualifying. Russell was straight out on a set of new soft tyres with Colapinto in hot pursuit, but the Williams went awry at turn 12 and set no initial time leaving Hamilton running P2 in his stead. Hamilton wasn't at all happy at being held up by Colapinto and made a mistake of his own. The short session meant there was no second chance.
The rest of the cars left it a little longer before turning out. Russell's lap time survived assaults from Leclerc, Norris and Sainz. However Verstappen found just that little bit extra to put him on top by 0.012s to claim sprint pole, a welcome qualifying rejuvenation for Red Bull.
Hulkenberg managed to snatch sixth ahead of the thwarted Hamilton, followed by Magnussen and Tsunoda. Colapinto could celebrate the first sprint grid top ten for Williams this season, despite his early SQ3 spin.
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