As F1 hosts its second sprint race weekend of the 2022 season, Max Verstappen stole pole position from Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc by just 0.29 seconds at Red Bull’s home turf. Leclerc was followed closely by Carlos Sainz Jr in the other Ferrari, with Spaniard showing an improved qualifying pace after his first race win at Silverstone. Sergio Perez rather predictably so capped up the top 4 with P4 in the second Res Bull. But things were tighter before Q3 as the Mercedes duo of Hamilton and Russell were challenging for pole but both crashed out in Q3 triggering the Red Bull twice within a span of minutes rending the 7-time world champion with just P10. Hamilton’s new teammate managed better despite the crash at P5.
Following Russell was Esteban Ocon in the Alpine in P6 with history 2-time former world champion teammate Fernando Alonso just managing P9. Surprisingly, the Haas duo of Kevin Magnussen and Mick Schumacher also made it to Q3. Magnussen was again rapid at P7 with Schumacher showing a great qualifying pace at P8.
Before this Q2 was particularly difficult for many teams. Pierre Gasly narrowly missed out to Q3 with just P11 in the AlphaTauri while his teammate Tsunoda managed just P14. Valtteri Bottas managed P13 in the Alfa Romeo ahead of Guanyu Zhou who managed P18. P12 was secured by the Williams of Alex Albon. The McLaren duo of Norris and Ricciardo didn’t make it to Q2 as they just managed P15 and P16. Aston Martin also had a similar story with Stroll managing P17 while Vettel will start the sprint race last at P20.
Latifi in the second Williams just managed P19. These classifications will be held for the sprint qualifying session tomorrow and the order at the end of that session will set the grid for the main race on Sunday.
2022 F1 Round 11 Austrian GP Qualifying Results: