Emilia Romangna GP - Qualifying Report

A new feature at this race weekend - rain!

Following his hot points success in Australia, Albon set fire to one of his brakes and brought out a Red Flag in Q1.  Not sure why as the Williams didn't leave any debris on the track; there was a lot of sweeping up anyway.  The track dried up but rain still threatened.  Latifi also managed to spin his Williams putting both cars in the bottom 3 positions.  Heros to zeros.  The porpoising on the Mercedes looked unbearable and they just scraped through the first session.  The Williams were joined by Ocon, who doesn't have the new floor, and got stuck in his garage and both Alpha Tauris.

Q2 saw rain clouds blowing in and drivers pushing to get multiple quick laps in on the same run.  Different drivers were setting personal bests and pushing.  Sainz pushed too hard in his Ferrari, clutching his brand new contract, lost the rear of his car and put it into the wall.  Another Red Flag.  By the time Sainz got back to the pit on a moped and his car was hauled out of the wall, the rain was falling heavily.  The Tfosi had their rain macs on and it looked like no one wanted to go out on track as there was no way to set a quicker time.  With a couple of minutes to go, some of the drivers came out to get a feel for the conditions.  So both Mercedes were out of Qualifying, along with the predictable three: Schumacher, Zhou and Stroll.

And Q3 started, off the 10 drivers went, then KMag went nose-first into the wall.  There were waved Yellow Flags...would it be a Red?  He drove it round the tarmac and back on track, it was still a Red Flag though.  The drivers get going and there were lots of contenders for pole battling it out, trying to avoid the slippery white lines.  Then, of course, another Red Flag as Bottas pulled his Alfa Romeo in to the side of the track.  So the drivers queued up at the end of the pit lane to get out at the front to try and have two stabs at pole.  Off they went...and Norris spun off, quite gently.  The sixth and final Red Flag secured his third place on the grid.  Verstappen got his first pole position of the year followed by LeClerc and Norris.  Magnussen did a good job starting fourth for the sprint, with Alonso behind him they need to make themselves very wide.

George Russell felt that they could make up this poor qualifying in the sprint, and there was the race too.  It's Friday hey!  Saturday, Sunday, what?