Here is our full text transcrip from qualifying for the 2023 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix:
Welcome all to build-up coverage to the final qualifying session of the 2023 Formula One season from Abu Dhabi’s Yas Marina Circuit. The qualifying hour gets underway at 2pm: so what could be in store for this afternoon?
Well, if final practice a little earlier on is anything to go by, we could be set for one of the best pole battles of the season. George Russell looks quick in the Mercedes, as does Lando Norris for McLaren, while hitherto all-conquering Max Verstappen struggled with the balance of his RB19 and at least appears slightly on the back foot heading into the session.
Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur speaking to Sky Sports F1 on the battle against Mercedes ahead of qualifying: “You don’t need to have an extra motivation in F1. It would be a mistake. It’s a good challenge. It’s quite tight. We had a good recovery because at one stage in the season we were 60 points behind and now we are four. It’s exciting for us to fight with Mercedes. We are all competitors. To be able to fight with Mercedes in the final race is a good one. I’m sure Toto will do the calculations every lap!”
The white line at the final corner that cars can’t go over with all four wheels if they don’t want to lose their lap time. One final hour of flat-out qualifying laps to come from F1’s drivers this year. It should be a cracker!
Qualifying is under way! Not exactly a big stampede out of the pit lane because no one has ventured out onto the track yet…
14 mins to go in Q1: The engines are roaring and the Red Bulls are first out there with the Williams drivers. It looks like everyone is following each other out onto the track. Let’s see to what extent Red Bull have managed to get their RB19 in a better place for qualifying. We will certainly hope they are still out of the sweet spot. All drivers but Russell now on track.
10 mins to go in Q1: Max Verstappen gets a handy slipstream from an Alpine down the backs straight and immediately puts in the fastest time of the weekend so far with a 1:24.160 to go 0.208s quicker than Lando Norris. Charles Leclerc goes third and Sergio Perez is sixth. Only ninth for George Russell and 13th for Lewis Hamilton on their opening hot laps in this session. Lots of work to do there on that evidence. George Russell was half a second slower compared to his table-topping P3 lap. It’s a jumbled up order with Alex Albon in fourth, Yuki Tsunoda in fifth and Daniel Ricciardo is eighth. Logan Sargeant, Zhou Guanyu and Nico Hulkenberg don’t have a time on the board because their laps were deleted for track limits.
13th for Hamilton, with the Aston Martins 14th and 15th, with three minutes to go and one more run to come. Plenty of further improvement expected with grip levels improving. 3 mins to go in Q1: Logan Sargeant jumps up to fourth and is the first driver to do their final run. However, his lap time is deleted again. He still doesn’t have a lap time on the board. Hamilton is going early and there’s a huge queue of cars coming out onto the track.
Perez knocks Sainz out of qualifying! Carlos Sainz is unfortunately out of qualifying. He improves on his last run but can only go 15th. Sergio Perez was in the drop zone but comes across the line to go second and knocks him out in Q1. A big blow for Ferrari in their hopes of beating Mercedes to second in the standings this weekend with one car starting down near the back.
Carlos Sainz on the team radio suggests drivers were going slowly out of the pit lane and blocking on the out lap “on purpose”. The Ferrari driver had “so much traffic” he adds. At the top, it was a Red Bull one-two as Max Verstappen led Sergio Perez. Verstappen actually had his second lap deleted but his effort from earlier in Q1 was enough to remain fastest. It’s a very tightly bunched field though as the AlphaTauris, Mercedes, McLarens and Williams were also up there. Q2 has begun but only Alex Albon is on the track for Williams. The Mercedes soon join him on used softs and Max Verstappen is on new rubber.
11 mins to go in Q2: New soft tyres for the Red Bull pair, used on the Mercedes’ and other cars, as we get going with the first runs of Q2. Alex Albon onto a timed lap first for Williams. Max Verstappen lights up the timing sheet on his new softs and is into the 1:23s. It’s a 1:23.740, which is a whopping 0.720s faster than George Russell, who is on used tyres.
8 mins to go in Q2: Quickest overall first and final sectors for the McLaren – on USED tyres too. The gap to Max Verstappen, who was on NEW softs, was only 0.180s. “That’s a cracking lap,” says Martin Brundle. Sergio Perez third in the second Red Bull, 0.376s back, with Oscar Piastri making it two McLarens in the top 10.
3 mins to go in Q2: The drivers are slowly wandering back onto the Yas Marina Circuit. Alex Albon was 13th but jumps into fifth! That might be good enough to get into the final part of qualifying. So Lewis Hamilton definitely does now need a quicker lap on this final attempt to get through to Q3 after Albon’s improvement drops him to 11th and the drop zone as it stands. He’s on his out lap now and will be one of the last drivers to cross the line to start his lap.
1 min to go in Q2: Charles Leclerc leaps up to third and Pierre Gasly goes fourth. Chequered flag: That’s not what Lewis or Mercedes needed! Underlining what appears to have been a tricky weekend so far in his W14, Hamilton did improve on his final lap but it was only good enough for 10th – and then that became 11th when team-mate George Russell vaulted from the drop zone to fourth place, 0.2s off the pace. Second week in a row Lewis has failed to make Q3, and the fourth overall this year, and ensures Russell ties their Saturday head-to-head for 2023 at 11-11.
A decent qualy for Yuki Tsunoda, who puts AlphaTauri into Q3 with Daniel Ricciardo only 15th in the sister car. Tsunoda therefore wins their mini Saturday head-to-head 4-3 too. It looks like we will have a big battle between Red Bull and McLaren for pole position. Red Bull were struggling in final practice but, somewhat as expected, they have turned up for qualifying when it matters most. Lando Norris has consistently been up there all weekend and is set to be Max Verstappen’s closest challenger.
And away we go for the final part of qualifying. Let’s find out who will be on pole position for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. 8 mins to go in Q3: It’s a very strong lap from Verstappen as he does a 1:23.445 which is 0.371s quicker than Norris, who’s on used tyres. Perez slots into third place and Tsunoda is a surprise fourth! Oscar Piastri gets into the game with third but is half a second behind Verstappen and Charles Leclerc is only eighth for Ferrari.
7 mins to go: Sergio Perez now down to fifth as George Russell slots the sole-remaining Mercedes into fourth with a decent lap. Perez reported he suffered “horrendous driveability” out of Turn One when he put the power down, with replays showing the Mexican’s car got out of shape over the kerb.
Both McLarens, Charles Leclerc and Fernando Alonso are ahead of Max Verstappen on the track as the drivers go early in Q3. Red Bull like quick out laps, so this will hinder Verstappen slightly. Pierre Gasly and George Russell will be the last drivers across the line.
1 min to go: The pole fight is on here on this evidence…can Norris, with a new overall fastest first sector, and Piastri hold it together through the rest of the lap?
Max Verstappen doesn’t improve but his first lap is good enough to take pole position. Charles Leclerc comes from nowhere to get onto the front row and is only 0.139s behind the Red Bull driver. An amazing lap from Charles! Oscar Piastri goes third after Lando Norris makes a big mistake in the middle sector and ends up fifth after George Russell jumps into fourth. What was only fifth for Sergio Perez becomes an even-more disappointing ninth as his final attempt is deleted for track limits at Turn One.
Leave a Reply