Verstappen holds off surging McLaren to take pole at Imola; Piastri qualifies P2 but served 3-place grid penalty, Norris P3; Leclerc P4, Sainz P5, disappointing the tifosi
Faced with the rapidly improving McLarens starting to fill up his rearview mirrors in 2024 and just a fortnight removed from being beaten out fair & square for the win in Miami by Lando Norris, Red Bull and Max Verstappen seemed on the back foot for much of the three practice sessions here at Imola for the return of the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix after a year’s hiatus. But, as team Red Bull and their Flying Dutchman have done so often in their rise to the pinnacle of Formula 1 over the past three-and-a-half years, Verstappen pulled a flier out of the bag when it mattered most during Saturday qualifying. While it was a razor thin margin, Verstappen hooked up all three sectors of this old school 4.9 km track to pip McLaren’s Oscar Piastri by a minuscule .074 seconds. The second McLaren of Norris set the third fastest time in Q3 but will start alongside Verstappen on the front row after Piastri was penalized three grid spots for impeding Haas’s Kevin Magnussen during Q1. Verstappen’s Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez had another perplexingly mediocre effort in quali and was bounced out in Q2 with only the eleventh quickest lap in that session.
There were a lot of expectations on Ferreri between some significant technical upgrades and being on home soil in front of the rabidly patriotic tifosi at the namesake Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari. But in qualifying, at least, it all ended up a bit disappointingly for the Scuderia, with Charles Leclerc only good enough for P4 and Sainz struggling even more so on his way to a distant P5, nearly three-tenths off his Monegasque teammate’s pace. Mercedes continued their underwhelming ways this year, with George Russell once again out-qualifying Lewis Hamilton, P6 to P8. Yuki Tsunoda split the Silver Arrows with an impressive final lap good enough for P7, while teammate Daniel Ricciardo continued to get to grips with the RB Honda en route to P9 on the grid. Haas’s Nico Hulkenberg made it into Q3 yet again and earned P10 for tomorrow’s GP start.
Top 10 qualifiers for the Emilia-Romagna GP:
| POS | DRIVER | Q1 | Q2 | Q3 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1:15.762 | 1:15.176 | 1:14.746 | |
| 2 | 1:15.940 | 1:15.407 | 1:14.820 | |
| 3 | 1:15.915 | 1:15.371 | 1:14.837 | |
| 4 | 1:15.823 | 1:15.328 | 1:14.970 | |
| 5 | 1:16.015 | 1:15.512 | 1:15.233 | |
| 6 | 1:16.107 | 1:15.671 | 1:15.234 | |
| 7 | 1:15.894 | 1:15.358 | 1:15.465 | |
| 8 | 1:16.604 | 1:15.677 | 1:15.504 | |
| 9 | 1:16.060 | 1:15.691 | 1:15.674 | |
| 10 | 1:15.841 | 1:15.569 | 1:15.980 |
Complete qualifying results available via Formula1.com.
Tomorrow’s race airs live on ESPN2 beginning at 9 am Eastern here in the States. With McLaren hot on the heels of Red Bulls usually supreme pace and Ferrari desperate to produce a result on Italian soil, Verstappen could have his hands full, not to mention the abundant gravel traps here at Imola potentially provoking Safety Car & Red Flag periods to introduce further unpredictability. Hope to see you then to find out how it all shakes out!