Max Verstappen jokes he’ll go ‘three-wide for the pictures’ on Lap 1 in Spanish GP

Max Verstappen teased he will make it three-wide “for the pictures” on the opening lap of the F1 Spanish Grand Prix.

Verstappen will start Sunday’s race from third on the grid, behind McLaren duo Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris.

The Dutchman set an identical lap to Mercedes’ George Russell, but as he set his lap time first, he will start ahead on the grid for the race.

While McLaren have a clear performance advantage, Verstappen is still in title contention.

Verstappen has won two of the opening eight races - the same as Norris.

He’s just 25 points behind Piastri with a large portion of the season to go.

With a long run down to Turn 1 at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, there could be fireworks on the first lap.

When asked how he would approach the first corner, Verstappen joked that it would be his “time to shine.”

Speaking in the FIA press conference, Verstappen said: “I think it’s time to shine in Turn 1, yeah. Make it three-wide for the pictures. Why not? I don’t know. Honestly, I think looking at pace it will be tough.

“As Oscar said, it’s not all about the start, Turn 1. You need to be good on tyres. It’s a long race - a lot can happen. I will just try to maximise what I got.”

Red Bull “lacking a bit too much”

Ultimately, the gap between Piastri and Verstappen was just over three-tenths.

The four-time world champion conceded he didn’t have the pace in the RB21.

“It was fine. I think it was consistently the same delta behind,” he explained.

“So Q1, Q2 and Q3. Just my first run in Q3 was a bit more difficult as we had a different outlap approach and it didn’t work. Clearly, lacking a bit too much. Sector one was quite tough. Turn 1 was never really good, even though I tried different approaches, and couldn’t find the grip there. It was fine. The car was in a decent window. Unfortunately, not fast enough. I had fun out there. Out here, qualifying flat-out, fast corners. It’s really enjoyable.”

When asked whether he could compete with the McLarens, he replied: “It’s going to be tough. My long run wasn’t bad. I think if we look at the difference today it will be tough to put up a really, really good fight. That doesn’t mean we’re not going to try. We will see tomorrow.”