Verstappen happy to reward fans with new record

Mas Verstappen took inspiration from thousands of Dutch and Belgian fans cheering him on at Spa-Francorchamps, and was thrilled to reward them with a new record-breaking performance.

Already the youngest-ever driver to win a Grand Prix in Formula One, Verstappen is now also the youngest driver to qualify on the front row after coming within two tenths of a second of pole winner Nico Rosberg on Saturday.

"It’s great to break a record, but I want to break other records," he said. "I’m very pleased to be second here in front of my fans, it’s just a great motivation when you see them next to the track.

"I’m just very happy to be on the front row in Spa," said the 18-year-old. "It’s great to drive in front of your fans, to show yourself."

Verstappen has been the fastest man in FP2 on Friday, but a problem with his ECU left him sidelined on Saturday morning. Although the team were able to fix the issue without incurring a penalty, the loss of track time at such a crucial point inevitably impacted his qualifying session.

"I think it was even more frustrating for myself that I couldn’t get the laps in," he said. "I couldn’t get my references in for qualifying but luckily it was not a big issue, we solved it in time and from there on it was just a really good qualifying.

“You can always do a better job but I think also Nico could have done a better lap, it’s always when you put everything together but I think in the end to be so close to them on a track with some long straights, we can be very pleased with that.

"The whole weekend has been very smooth, even though I had some issues this morning but from there on, the mechanics did a great job and in qualifying the car was working really well as you could see in sector two.”

As a result of qualifying, Verstappen will be starting the race on the short-life supersoft tyres, something that the driver says was entirely intentional.

"I decided together with the team that I wanted to run the super-soft so I think that’s the best strategy to go into tomorrow," he said. “To start on the super-soft and see where we end up after a few laps.

"We have some different strategies out there but I think at the end of the day maybe we have to box a bit earlier but afterwards I think there are still a lot of laps to go and we’ll see what happens."

QUALIFYING REPORT: Rosberg edges Verstappen and Raikkonen for pole

Silbermann says ... Spa too hot

Romain Grosjean column: More motivated than ever

Chris Medland's 2016 Belgian Grand Prix preview

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