Baku, November 30, AZERTAC

Lando Norris has surged to pole position for the Sprint at the Qatar Grand Prix, with the Briton topping every segment of a busy Sprint Qualifying session, while George Russell disrupted what looked to be a McLaren front row lockout by going second quickest, according to the Formula 1 official website.

Having set the pace in SQ1 and SQ2, Norris was quick to repeat the feat in SQ3 with an eye-catching effort of 1m 21.012s – and as the pack tried to better their times, that benchmark was ultimately undefeated.

Oscar Piastri seemed on course to start alongside his team mate in P2, before Russell slotted in-between them with a lap 0.063s behind Norris’s. This pushed Piastri down to third, while Carlos Sainz took fourth for Ferrari after leaving it late to put a representative time on the board.

Fellow Scuderia driver Charles Leclerc followed in fifth, while world champion Max Verstappen was sixth for Red Bull ahead of Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton in seventh. Pierre Gasly had another good qualifying for Alpine in eighth, and the Haas of Nico Hulkenberg and RB’s Liam Lawson rounded out the top 10.

Fernando Alonso missed out on joining the top-10 shootout, the Aston Martin man being pushed out of SQ2 in 11th. He will share the sixth row with the Williams of Alex Albon, ahead of Kick Sauber’s Valtteri Bottas who enjoyed a solid Sprint Qualifying session.

Lance Stroll made it a double elimination for Aston Martin as the Canadian ended the segment in P14, while Kevin Magnussen also failed to progress further in P15 for Haas.

It was another tough day for Sergio Perez, with the Red Bull driver again suffering an early departure in P16. Yuki Tsunoda will likely be disappointed, too, having exited in P17 for RB.

Joining them in the elimination zone in SQ1 were the Alpine of Esteban Ocon, Kick Sauber’s Zhou Guanyu and Franco Colapinto in the Williams from 18th to 20th respectively.

With the grid now decided, the drivers will next return to action for the Sprint on Saturday, which is set to begin at 1700 local time.