Liam Lawson will start Monday’s Qatar Grand Prix from 18th on the grid, having been eliminated from Q1 in this morning’s qualifying session.
Max Verstappen claimed his tenth pole position of the season and will start next to George Russell on the front row after McLaren duo Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri had their lap times deleted following the session.
The 2021 Qatar Grand Prix winner, Lewis Hamilton, starts from third, next to Fernando Alonso. Charles Leclerc is the top Ferrari driver in fifth and has Piastri for company on the third row, ahead of Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon, who make for an all-Alpine Row 4.
Valtteri Bottas and Norris round out the top ten. Lawson’s AlphaTauri teammate, Yuki Tsunoda, qualified 11th.
The high-speed circuit, combined with a dusty surface with limited grip, made for a tricky outing for the field, and track limit violations were a problem across all three sessions.
Lawson set a best time of 1:26.635 across ten laps in Q1, which saw him fall half a second short of progressing to Q2. Joining him on Row 9 is Lance Stroll, who again struggled for pace at Aston Martin.
Kevin Magnussen and Zhou Guanyu start from the rear of the grid, while Logan Sargeant was knocked out of the session in 16th following a late final flyer from teammate Alex Albon.
Carlos Sainz and Sergio Perez were the biggest names eliminated in Q2, with the former struggling on pace and impeding Verstappen in the buildup to his final flyer before qualifying 12th. Perez was another to have a lap time deleted and starts 13th, next to Albon.
Nico Hulkenberg starts 15th, while Tsnoda missed qualifying for Q3 by six-tenths of a second and lines up 11th.
Norris had moved to second in Q3, only to have his lap time deleted for a track limits violation. This promoted Australian rookie Piastri to the front row, a position he believed he held until his post-race interview when news of his time’s deletion came through, dropping him to sixth.
Sunday morning brings the Sprint Shootout at 1.30 am (NZ time) to set the grid for the Sprint race at 5.30 am, with the Qatar Grand Prix beginning at 6.00 am on Monday.
Header Image: Getty Images/ Red Bull Content Pool
