Qatar GP Qualifying Report

Qatar is quite a straight forward event, even with night racing and a sprint.

Qualifying was uneventful in Q1.  Out went Lawson, Magnussen (trumped by Hulkenberg), Sargeant (just pushed out by his team mate), Zhou and Stroll.  Whilst Stroll starts in 17th, his team mate was the fastest car on the straights and finished the first session in 3rd. Stroll then gave sub-Raikkonen one-word sullen answers in the press pen.  This probably isn't going to quash the rumours that his father is going to sell the team he bought for his son.

Q2 was slightly more interesting.  Tsunoda led the way for those exiting, followed by Sainz, Perez, Albon and Hulkenberg.  With Perez being the only driver who can challenge Verstappen for the championship, he did not need a lap deleted for going over track limits.  Sainz also put in a shocker.  Hamilton came back from being second to his team mate in the first session to put in the quickest lap in this session.

Through Qualifying, Norris had been on and off the track, with lap times being deleted.  Having finished second, it happened again and he ended up in 10th handing 3rd place to his team mate Piastri.  As Piastri was being interviewed, the interviewer was informed that Piastri was now in 6th as he too had gone over the track limits line.  Hamilton had a big slide and finished behind his team mate, who was second.  Verstappen went out to put in some more quick laps but ended up watching the remainder of Qualifying from the pits, out of the car and chatting.  The final classification was Verstappen (didn't even consider going near a white line), Russell (never a rule breaker), Hamilton (still unhappy), Alonso (I thought he was 4th before lap times being deleted, so not sure how he finished 4th and not -2nd), LeClerc (disappointing), Piastri, Gasly, Ocon (cracks beginning to show at Alpine), Bottas and Norris.