Lewis Hamilton took pole position for the 2021 Qatar Grand Prix. And, for the just the second time this season, it’s Hamilton with the front-row advantage over Max Verstappen.
Behind Mercedes and Red Bull, the battle between McLaren and Ferrari has been just as close and tense. It was a fight that was being led by McLaren for much of the year – and that Italian GP win for Daniel Ricciardo gave them a big buffer.
But since the next race in Russia – when, by the way, Ferrari upgraded the battery of their engine – the Scuderia have outscored McLaren by 86 points to 41. That has given them a 31.5-point advantage ahead of the Qatar GP, and the pace so far points to Ferrari being favourites in that battle again. Ferrari were well over half a second quicker in final practice.
And it turned out to be a difficult qualifying session for both McLaren and Ferrari, as Daniel Ricciardo was knocked out in Q2 (P14), just like Charles Leclerc, who will start tomorrow’s race from 13th place. On a more surprising note, Sergio Perez was also knocked out in Q2 in the Red Bull.
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For Ferrari this meant that Carlos Sainz was left battling Lando Norris in the Q3 shootout and unfortunately the Spanish driver missed out on Lando Norris’ P6 by just a tenth. Carlos will start the race from P7, ahead of Yuki Tsunoda and Esteban Ocon. Solid performances from Pierre Gasly in fourth place for AlphaTauri and Fernando Alonso, fifth for Alpine.
Here are the complete results from qualifying ahead of tomorrow’s 2021 F1 World Championship race at the Losail International Circuit.
Results (Classification):
Q3
Lewis Hamilton Mercedes – 1.20.827
Max Verstappen Red Bull Racing +0.455
Valtteri Bottas Mercedes +0.651
Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri +0.813
Fernando Alonso Alpine +0.843
Lando Norris McLaren +0.904
Carlos Sainz Scuderia Ferrari +1.013
Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri +1.054
Esteban Ocon Alpine +1.201
Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin +1.958
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