Once again, it is Mercedes’ Kimi Antonelli who takes P1 in qualifying for the third race weekend in a row.
After McLaren seemed to dominate the sprint race this morning, there were questions about whether Mercedes had lost their edge against the competition, but this evening’s qualifying session answered those questions for everyone after the young Italian managed to get pole despite making a minor mistake in Q3.
It was an unpredictable qualifying session, with many different teams in contention for pole. Still, it was Max Verstappen who had the Mercedes garage holding their breath in the final moments as the Red Bull driver was making improvements on an already very quick time, but it wasn’t quite enough, and the Dutchman had to settle for P2.There are many reports of bad weather tomorrow, possibly affecting the race and especially its start time. We haven’t seen these cars go properly racing in the wet weather yet, so concerns of visibility and speed are already being heard, but as we know, wet weather regularly makes for an extremely chaotic race.
A team that might not be opposed to a bit of chaos tomorrow is Ferrari, as Charles Leclerc finished in third and Lewis Hamilton in sixth. The fans of the prancing horses will be hoping for a couple of moves to be made tomorrow to get both drivers further up the grid, and maybe with a bit of luck, even a double podium.
Embed from Getty ImagesRiding high on the success in this morning’s sprint race, both McLaren drivers were probably expecting a bit more in this qualifying session, but it wasn’t really to be for either driver. This morning’s sprint race winner, Lando Norris, was once again the more successful of the two in fourth, but all hope is not lost, as once again the rain may bring opportunities to the table that may not be so promising in the dry.
Further down the grid, we have Perez, Bottas and Bortoleto taking 20th, 21st and 22nd position. A tough day in the office for Cadillac, but possibly a day that was to be expected. Just like we’ve had Antonelli consistently at the top these last few races, we’ve also sadly had consistency when it comes to the teams and drivers getting eliminated in Q1.
A lot of work went on in the three-week break for all teams, but for teams like Cadillac and Aston Martin, it seems like there may still be a struggle to get their cars in any position higher than 17th and into Q2.
All is still to play for, though, so make sure to join me again tomorrow, half an hour before the race starts, as I will be live-blogging it here for you all.