Max Verstappen claimed pole position for the Austrian Grand Prix with an immense lap here. But his mastery of the circuit stood in stark contrast to a woeful showing from the Mercedes drivers, Lewis Hamilton and George Russell, who ended the day with their cars in the barriers.
For Mercedes a long weekend lies ahead after they suffered a disastrous afternoon in Spielberg. Hamilton crashed out in Q3, taking a major impact and shortly afterwards Russell did likewise. Fortunately neither was hurt after uncharacteristic errors. Hamilton finished ninth and Russell fourth. A setback for the team who had been hoping to build on the improvement shown at the British GP.
Hamilton was disconsolate and unable to explain how he had lost the car. “I’m incredibly disappointed in myself ultimately,” he said. “I’m so sorry to the team, everyone worked so hard to put this car together and I never like to damage it or bring it back damaged. We were fighting for a top three I think and I don’t have an answer. I just lost the back end in turn seven and that was that.”
With the weekend hosting the sprint race format on Saturday, which will set the grid for Sunday’s GP, they have the chance to come back and make up places as their car looked competitive but a long night beckons for the Mercedes mechanics.
Verstappen, in superb form at his team’s home grand prix, put in a great final run that ensures he will start at the front of the grid for the sprint race. The Red Bull driver beat the Ferraris of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz into second and third. In a hugely competitive session the top three were separated by just eight-hundredths of a second. Red Bull’s Sergio Pérez had taken fourth place but having been found to have exceeded track limits during his hot lap in Q2, his Q3 times were deleted and he was demoted to 13th, moving other drivers up the grid.
Verstappen set the pace on his first hot run in Q3 with a time of 1min 5.092secs. However behind him Hamilton had a shocker. Entering turn seven he lost the rear, tried to correct but could not hold it. He went off and took a side-on impact that may have damaged his gearbox requiring a replacement.
Some of the fiercely partisan Dutch contingent in the crowd cheered his misfortune and, when the session restarted, Russell promptly followed Hamilton into the barriers. He went in hot at turn 10, spun and slid off backwards.
He too rued what he saw as a driver error in pushing too hard. “I would not say [it was] a lucky escape. There is nothing lucky or fortunate about making a mistake like that,” he said. “I could have been fourth. I was a tenth up on my lap and I went for it. I could have been on for third but we need to see how much damage is done, so sorry to the team and the garage.”
Red-flagged again, the final runs were a tense one-lap shootout and Leclerc had the advantage only for Verstappen to pull out a mighty final sector, particularly the last two corners, to set a time of 1min 4.984, two hundredths up on the Ferrari.
Kevin Magnussen and Mick Schumacher were in sixth and seventh for Haas. Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso were in fifth and eighth for Alpine and Pierre Gasly in tenth for AlphaTauri.
Valtteri Bottas was classified in 12th place where he will start the sprint race. However after taking a new powerunit, the ensuing penalties means he will start Sunday’s GP from the back of the grid. Yuki Tsunoda was 14th for AlphaTauri. Alex Albon was 11th for Williams and Lando Norris 15th for McLaren.
Daniel Ricciardo was 16th for McLaren. Guanyu Zhou was in 18th for Alfa Romeo, his first time in a competitive session since he suffered an enormous crash at Silverstone last week. Nicholas Latifi was 19th for Williams. Sebastian Vettel and Lance Stroll in 17th and 20th for Aston Martin.
