Magnussen takes shock first pole for sprint race

The Dane, who was recalled to the team for this season after the ousting of Russian driver Nikita Mazepin, remarkably landed top spot when a red flag in a murky Q3 allowed conditions to deteriorate.

That meant no one could improve in the final minutes of qualifying to leave the American outfit to watch the clock until it was assured of its maiden pole and the celebrations erupted.

The drama of Q3 began when Ferrari took a major gamble by sending Leclerc out on a set of intermediate tyres to pre-empt the return of rain – qualifying having started damp before drying up.

The nine other contenders, meanwhile, emerged on slick Pirelli tyres.

The Scuderia appeared to be hoping that the showers would arrive in time to catch out the dry runners while its driver would be on the right compound at the optimum time before the conditions got worse.

However, Leclerc soon realised he was the odd on out and was venting his anger, even waving to the pit wall as he passed to begin his flying lap.

He ran slowest of all through the first sector, was struggling for grip and holding up the pursuing Sergio Perez before aborting the run and diving into the pitlane for a shot on slicks.

With the intermediates now clearly the wrong option, slick-runner Magnussen was able to bolt to a 1m11.674s lap to take top spot away from Red Bull’s Verstappen by some two tenths, the Dutch driver having locked up at Turn 8 to ultimate cost him pole.

Then George Russell – who had just ran to third place – dropped his Mercedes W13 into the gravel on the exit of Turn 4 to bring out the red flags.

The Brit appeared to lock the front-right into the left-hander and the rear clipped the slippery white line to pitch him off. As he tried to spin to recover, he ditched the rear axle into the gravel.

While Russell initially kept the rear wheels spinning and signalled to the marshals to perform a live recovery of his car, he eventually retired from the session.

But with the threat of rain having already loomed large, the delay was long enough to allow the wet weather to return and no one could find time despite more than five minutes remaining.

In the knowledge that they would not improve, the drivers started to exit their cars to cue the Haas celebrations.

Russell would therefore keep third place despite his shunt, while Lando Norris clocked fourth for McLaren ahead of Carlos Sainz – although the Ferrari driver…