Lando Norris secured his first pole position of the 2024 season in Barcelona, pipping Max Verstappen by just 0.020s in qualifying.
The McLaren driver managed to beat Verstappen’s fastest lap with his final effort to take his third pole position of his career. Lewis Hamilton will line up alongside the pair in third.
Q1
For the first time in the weekend, clouds over the Circuit de Catalunya greeted teams as qualifying began. Track temperatures were lower than they had been for the three practice sessions, but not dramatically so.
Max Verstappen put his Red Bull quickest of all by posting comfortably the fastest time of the weekend so far with a 1’12.306. That was beaten, however, by Charles Leclerc by a whisker under five-hundredths of a second as all drivers immediately employed the soft compound for the opening phase of qualifying.
After several incidents of drivers complaining about traffic in final practice, Lance Stroll was unhappy Logan Sargeantgot in his way at turn 10 during his first flying lap. The stewards will investigate the incident after qualifying.
Williams took advantage of a completely clear track to send Alexander Albon out for his final run in the session. He used the lack of traffic to jump from the drop zone into 12th, but with a handful of minutes still remaining for his rivals to improve.
With under two minutes remaining, both RBs of Daniel Ricciardo and Yuki Tsunoda, Zhou Guanyu’s Sauber, Kevin Magnussen’s Haas and Sargeant’s Williams were in danger of being eliminated at the first hurdle.
Zhou improved to go safe, joining his team mate into Q2. Magnussen gained time on his final run but was half a tenth away from safety in 16th, becoming the fastest driver eliminated. He was joined by both RBs of Tsunoda and Ricciardo, with Albon slipping down to 19th by the chequered flag. Sargeant was eliminated slowest, three tenths slower than his team mate.
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Q1 result
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Q2
Lance Stroll’s antics in the final practice session, driving into Lewis Hamilton in frustration at being held up and earning a reprimand, appeared to make the rest of the field reluctant to join him on track at the start of Q2. He had a entirely clear track in which to post the first time of the session, and produced a 1’13.630 on his used soft tyres.
Eventually the other 14 remaining drivers returned to the track with under ten minutes…
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