Verstappen charges to back-to-back F1 poles at Styrian GP
A third pole of the season for Verstappen never looked in doubt as the Red Bull driver posted two laps good enough for pole and was the only man to dip below the 1m04s bracket on a 1m03.841s.
Verstappen ended up 0.194s clear of Valtteri Bottas, though the Mercedes driver will drop three places on the grid due to picking up a penalty for his pitlane spin in practice.
Instead, it will be his teammate Lewis Hamilton who will join his title rival on the front row of the grid.
Hamilton struggled to hook up a lap good enough to challenge Verstappen despite having three attempts in Q3 as he wound up 0.226s adrift having ran wide on his final flying effort.
A stunning lap from Lando Norris secured fourth place for the McLaren driver, with the Briton just 0.279s shy of Verstappen’s pole time. Norris will move ahead of Bottas to start from third.
Sergio Perez was unable to replicate his Red Bull teammate’s scintillating pace as he took fifth place ahead of AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.
Yuki Tsunoda advanced to Q3 for just the second time in his rookie season as he claimed eighth, though the AlphaTauri driver is under investigation for blocking Bottas during the first runs in Q3.
Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll completed the rest of the top-10 order for Alpine and Aston Martin.
George Russell agonisingly missed out on a first-ever Q3 appearance for Williams by just 0.008s as he kept up his 100% record of Q2 outings in 2021 with a brilliant lap to take 11th.
The Mercedes protege impressed as he outpaced Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz and Daniel Ricciardo’s McLaren, with the latter pair both suffering disappointing qualifying sessions on their way to P12 and P13.
Aston Martin driver Sebastian Vettel had his fastest lap deleted for track limits and dropped to 14th, ahead of Antonio Giovinazzi, who outqualified teammate Kimi Raikkonen for the sixth time this season in his latest Q2 appearance.
Despite posting an eye-catching first push lap, Nicholas Latifi was unable to join his Williams teammate in Q2 and was shuffled down the order as others improved around him on their final runs to end up 16th.
Latifi was joined in the bottom five by Alpine’s Esteban Ocon, who could only manage the 17th-best time as he suffered a surprise elimination in Q1 to mark his worst qualifying result of the season.
In contrast to his Alfa Romeo teammate, Raikkonen also endured a tough qualifying, with a trip through the Turn 4 gravel proving costly on his way to a lowly 18th.
The experienced Finn will line up on the grid for Sunday’s race ahead of only the Haas duo of Mick Schumacher and Nikita Mazepin, who were once again restricted to the back row.
Click here for full qualifying results for the 2021 F1 Styrian Grand Prix.
