Carlos Sainz secures maiden pole at soggy Silverstone

Carlos Sainz grabbed his maiden F1 pole position on a soaking Silverstone circuit, timing his final British Grand Prix qualifying effort to perfection.

In a Q3 when timing was everything on a track starting to dry out after a showery session, the Ferrari man pipped Max Verstappen by 0.072sec.

Charles Leclerc will start third in the other Ferrari, ahead of Sergio Perez – with Mercedes duo Lewis Hamilton and George Russell fifth and eighth respectively.

Although the Silverstone spectators managed to get away without a soaking in FP3, as the clock ticked down to qualifying it became obvious a wet session was on the cards.

It was on with the jackets and up with the umbrellas in the grandstands as a second consecutive F1 rainy qualifying session took place, following Canada two weeks ago.

The downpour was duly under way as the cars headed out for the 18 minutes of Q1, all fitted with intermediate tyres, as Daniel Ricciardo‘s race engineer predicted over the team radio an end to the shower before the first chequered flag – offering the prospect of an exciting denouement had anyone dared to risk slicks.

Thrills and spills appeared inevitable but the 20 drivers kept it remarkably clean and it came down to sheer pace in the conditions at the end, with Haas and local team Aston Martin the big sufferers as all four of their cars finished in the bottom five.

They were joined by Alex Albon, whose Williams team-mate Nicholas Latifi went through to Q2 for the first time this year at his colleague’s expense. Albon was fuming over the team radio: “Why are we doing cool-down laps?” He clearly felt he should have been pushing throughout, to keep his tyres up to temperature.

🚨 OUT IN Q1 🚨

16. Alex Albon
17. Kevin Magnussen
18. Sebastian Vettel
19. Mick Schumacher
20. Lance Stroll

Not good news for the team based up the road at Silverstone.#BritishGP 🇬🇧 #F1 pic.twitter.com/dNs2Ez0Z7n

— PlanetF1 (@Planet_F1) July 2, 2022

In contrast to the weather forecast from McLaren, the rain continued steadily if not torrentially in Q2 – but the slippery track was doing nothing to suggest Verstappen was on course for anything other than pole position following a sublime performance in Q3.

Fastest by over seven tenths of a second in Q1, the Dutchman was continuing to shine amid the increasing gloom and again topped the timesheet as the 12 minutes progressed, over four tenths clear and with the usual suspects his closest rivals.

Quicker times proved impossible…