Max Verstappen on pole in front of Zandvoort home crowd: 'It's unbelievable'

Published on 03 September 2022 by Mike Motilall

Max Verstappen has grabbed pole position for the Dutch Grand Prix. I a thrilling qualifying, Max pulled out a lap time in the closing stages that was slightly faster than Charles Leclerc. This puts the Dutchman on pole for his home race in Zandvoort for the second time in a row now. Charles Leclerc’s and Carlos Sainz’ Ferraris both came in second and third. Max’ Red Bull team mate, Sergio Perez, spun out on his final flying lap and finished fifth fastest.

After qualifying and in front of a crazy crowd, Max had the following to say about his pole: “It’s unbelievable, especially after yesterday when we had a difficult day. We worked very hard with the team overnight to turn it around. We changed a lot, because yesterday was a bit rushed in FP2 to get the car together and because of that we were not able to gather that much info. This morning was more about getting to know the car and fine tuning for qualifying. In qualifying we had a quick car again and it was enjoyable again to drive.”

On the Spa-Francorchamps circuit Verstappen dominated, but the competition was a bit closer today during qualifying on Zandvoort: “We have a complete car”, is what Max says about his RB18. “You can see how quickly it changes. In Spa we were dominant, here it was a bit trickly and we were very close to each other in qualifying. You can see on high downforce tracks, we struggle to extract the maximum from the car in qualifying. But it’s still a quick car. Tomorrow will be exciting even though that has been the case for many races this year. I am looking forward to it and hope we have a good race.”

Finally Max talks about his appreciation for the spectacular Circuit Zandvoort and particularly about his fans on the grand stands: “To do a fast lap around here during qualifying is really insane. It’s super to see that much orange here and the support this whole weekend is great, thank you.”

In front of about some 100.000 fans, all dressed in orange, qualifying gets underway on Circuit Zandvoort. Both Haas-drivers are the first to head out on track in Q1. A lot of mid-field drivers quickly follow suit. Five minutes into the session, Verstappen also heads out on track as his fans loudly cheer him on. On a set of the soft compound tyres, Max does a 1:11.317, which immediately puts him at the top of the leaderboard. After this quick lap, the Dutchman returns back to the pits and decides to stay in for the remainder of the session.

The rest of the drivers have a tough nut to crack regarding the time Verstappen set. Nobody is able to beat Max’ time which enables Max to finish Q1 in first place, ahead of Lewis Hamilton and Yuki Tsunoda. Sebastian Vettel hits the gravel trap on his final flying lap at Turn 13. Dropouts after the first part of qualifying are: Valtteri Bottas (P16), Kevin Magnussen (P17), Daniel Ricciardo (P18), Sebastian Vettel (P19) and last but not least Nicholas Latifi.

Just after Q2 gets underway, the red flag is triggered. An orange flare has been thrown on the track and needs to be removed. When the lights turn green again, Max is quick to head back out on track on a set of the softs. With a 1:10.927 he immediately clocks the fastest time and heads back to the pits again. With the exception of Verstappen, all the drivers make to the track again for a second run. Even though that Carlos Sainz and George Russell improve on Verstappen’s time, the Dutchman safely makes it to the final part of qualifying in P3. Drivers sent to the showers in Q2 are: Pierre Gasly (P11), Esteban Ocon (P12), Fernando Alonso (P13), Zhou Guanyu (P14) and Alexander Albon (P15).

In Q3, Max is the first one to head out on track. With a 1:10.515, Max is just slightly slower than Leclerc, who is first, after his first run. The drivers get an additional flying lap in which enables Leclerc to shave off a bit of his time, but Max just barely betters that. This puts the Dutchman on pole for his home race for the second time in a row now on Zandvoort. Sergio Perez spins on his final flying lap at Turn 13 which causes the trailing Mercedes’ to not being able to improve on their time. Leclerc is with just 21 thousandths of a second slower than Verstappen and comes in second, Ferrari-team mate Carlos Sainz finishes third fastest. Lewis Hamilton is fourth with Perez behind him in P5. George Russell comes in sixth while Lando Norris is ‘best of the rest’ in seventh. Mick Schumacher, Yuki Tsunoda and Lance Stroll round out the top ten.  

The race for the Dutch Grand Prix starts on Sunday at 15.00 hrs. local Dutch time.

Contest Dutch GP: win a 1:4 scale model Max Verstappen Dutch GP 2022 helmet!

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