Oscar Piastri takes pole for the sprint race

Oscar Piastri takes pole position in qualifying for tomorrow's sprint race. The McLaren driver set an incredible time of 1:08.89, beating his teammate Lando Norris by just 0.029 thousandths. Charles Leclerc completes the top 3 of the grid.

Photo: Mclaren 

During the first part of qualifying, the track temperature was 40 degrees, considerably lower compared to the free practice session. From this initial phase, the McLarens led the time table. Lando Norris achieved an impressive time of 1:09.74, becoming the first driver to go under 1:10.

With this, we say goodbye to Fernando Alonso, Esteban Ocon, Yuki Tsunoda, Lance Stroll and Zhou. Both Aston Martins are eliminated in this part of the session.

In the second half there were big surprises. Checo Pérez was eliminated because he left the pits too late and could not complete his second fastest lap attempt. For his part, Lewis Hamilton was also left out, since the time he achieved was not enough to enter the top 10. In addition, Hulkenberg, Colapinto and Bottas were also eliminated in this second half.

In the last part, the possibility of rain was expected, which ultimately did not occur. However, this led to both McLaren drivers coming out very early to set their lap times. Lando Norris once again achieved an incredible time of 1:08.92. Despite this, in the final minutes, his teammate Oscar Piastri managed to open a second lap, snatching pole position from him.

Tomorrow, in the sprint race, we will see both McLaren drivers starting from the front row. In the second row will be Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen; in the third, Carlos Sainz and George Russell; in the fourth, Pierre Gasly and Liam Lawson; and in the fifth row, Alexander Albon and Ollie Bearman, whose time was eliminated in his last attempt because it went out of track limits.