Oracle Red Bull Racing

Max Produces Blistering Pace For Bahrain Pole

Max claims the Team's first pole at the opening round since 2013. As Checo starts P11 in tomorrow's Bahrain Grand Prix.

Max delivered a searing lap in the desert heat to claim a sensational pole position for tomorrow’s season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix, with the Dutch driver taking P1 almost four tenths of a second ahead of seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton and the Briton’s Mercedes teammate Valtteri Bottas.

It wasn’t an entirely perfect afternoon for the Bulls, however, with unfortunately narrowly missing out on a Q3 spot after being edged out to P11 late in the middle segment.

Q1

Max was on top from the opening runs of Q1 and with his first lap of the session he powered to the top of the timesheet with a lap of 1:30.499. That put him a little over a tenth ahead of the impressive Yuki Tsunoda of AlphaTauri and 0.118s ahead of Hamilton. Checo, meanwhile, claimed P5 with a lap of 1:31.165.

In the drop zone ahead of the final runs were Alpine’s Esteban Ocon followed by Williams’ Nicholas Latifi and George Russell, and then the Haas cars of Nikita Mazepin and Mick Schumacher.

The only one of that quintet to escape the drop zone was Russell who crossed the line first in the final runs to rise to P7. He eventually progressed in P13.

Behind Russell, Mazepin spun going into turn one and that brought out the yellow flags. When the final runs were completed Ocon was dumped out of the session in P16 ahead of Latifi, but Q1’s major fall guy was Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel who exited in P18. Haas' Mick Schumacher went out in P19 ahead of teammate Mazepin.

Bahrain Grand Prix 2021: Qualifying

That Pole Position Feeling

Max Parks It Up In P1

Some Final Words Of Encouragement

Fully Focussed For Quali

Getting Ready For Quali

Thumbs Up From The Dutchman

Max On Pole In Bahrain

Checo Heads Out On Mediums

Max Lights It Up On Softs

Max To Start On Medium Tyres Tomorrow

Checo On A Flying Lap In Q1

Q2

At the start of Q2 the Bulls took to the track on medium tyres, a tactic matched by Mercedes, McLaren and AlphaTauri.

Max set an opening time of 1:30.318 to take an early P1 but that was swiftly bypassed by Hamilton who set a time of 1:30.085. Checo opened with a lap of 1:30.715 but the Mexican’s time was soon deleted for exceeding track limits and he fell into the drop zone ahead of the final runs.

Checo stuck with the medium compound Pirellis for his final run, but as a flurry of quick laps were posted by soft-tyre runners – Carlos Sainz claimed top spot ahead of Ferrari teammate Charles Leclerc – Sergio again dropped down the order, from P4 after completing his lap to a shock P11 at the end of the segment. The Mexican exited qualifying ahead of Alfa Romeo’s Antonio Giovinazzi, Tsunoda, the second Alfa or Kimi Räikkönen and Russell.

Q3

After ceding P1 in the middle segment Max reclaimed top spot in the first runs of the top-10 shootout, setting a provisional pole time of 1:29.526. That put him two hundredths of a second ahead of Hamilton, with Gasly third ahead of Bottas. Ahead of the final runs Sainz held P5 for Ferrari, with Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll P6 ahead of Ricciardo, Norris, Leclerc and Alonso.

A tight battle in the opening laps of the final top-10 shootout of qualifying saw Max take provisional pole just two hundredths of a second ahead of defending champion Hamilton. And then in the final runs seven-time champion Hamilton initially edged ahead with a lap of 1:29.385.

Max, though, was finding more and more time after what he later described as an unsatisfactory opening run. A session-best time in the first sector led to a purple time in the middle part of the lap and when the Red Bull driver crossed the line, he claimed pole almost four tenths of a second ahead of Hamilton and almost seven tenths ahead of third-placed Bottas in the second Mercedes.

P4 in qualifying went to Leclerc, with the Monegasque finishing ahead of Gasly, Ricciardo, Norris, Sainz, the returning Alonso and Stroll.

WhatWasSaid:

Max

It’s a great feeling to be on pole and I haven’t experienced a season start like this.

Max Verstappen

“It’s a great feeling to be on pole and I haven’t experienced a season start like this. After the victory in Abu Dhabi the whole Team has been pushing really hard and even more motivated. There is still no guarantee for the rest of the year but everyone here and back at the factory have done a great job to give me a car like this and they should be very proud. Honda have also been working very hard this winter, just like every year. They are flat out all of the time and like us they just want to win. It is really enjoyable working with them and they are very passionate which I like, so a big credit to Honda for the result today as they have had a great winter.

We have to finish it off tomorrow but if I can have a good start I’m confident we can do a good job.

Max Verstappen

"After testing it is always difficult to know where you are and we really didn’t know how it would be in qualifying but when you have a lap like that in Q3 and such a good feeling in the car you can be happy. We have to finish it off tomorrow but if I can have a good start I’m confident we can do a good job.”

Sergio

“Congratulations to Max and the Team on pole position as that’s the perfect way to start the season. On my side I wasn’t expecting to qualify in eleventh and obviously it’s not an ideal start but we are making progress and I made a good step between FP3 and qualifying, it just wasn’t enough. We were absolutely right to use the medium tyres in Q2 but unfortunately it just didn’t pay off and I didn’t deliver the lap I should have. I went wide at turn 13 and lost a couple of tenths and the field is so tight that it knocked me out of Q3. It’s a shame as the extra kilometres and comparison to Max would have helped me to progress but tomorrow is a new day and anything can happen around this track so hopefully we can make a good recovery.”

ChristianHorner

It’s fantastic to start the season this way, our first pole at the opening round since 2013.

Christian Horner CBE

“It’s fantastic to start the season this way, our first pole at the opening round since 2013 and Honda’s first since Senna in 1991. You never really know where you are at the first race of the year when the fuel comes out and the engine modes are turned up. It was nip and tuck in Q2 and it looked like Mercedes had a small advantage on the medium tyre but then Max came back on the softs. Sergio was unfortunate to just miss out on making it through to Q3. He’s got a huge amount of maturity and experience and he’s adapting well. He’s only had 1.5 days of testing and everything is very new for him in terms of how the car feels, but he will be competitive in the race tomorrow and should not be counted out.

The whole Team worked tremendously hard over the winter to put us in this position.

Christian Horner CBE

"The whole Team worked tremendously hard over the winter to put us in this position and Honda and ExxonMobil have also done a stellar job for us. Tomorrow is going to be very tight and Mercedes have turned it up, everyone wrote them off two weeks ago and they’re right up there as we expected. It will be a massive challenge for us to beat them but we’re starting from the best possible place.”

BahrainQualifyingTop10

Position	Driver	Team	Time
1.	2.	3.	4.	5.	6.	7.	8.	9.	10.	11.
Max Verstappen	Lewis Hamilton	Valtteri Bottas	Charles Leclerc	Pierre Gasly	Daniel Ricciardo	Lando Norris	Carlos Sainz	Fernando Alonso	Lance Stroll	Sergio Pérez
Red Bull Racing Honda	Mercedes	Mercedes	Ferrari	AlphaTauri	McLaren	McLaren	Ferrari	Alpine	Aston Martin	Red Bull Racing Honda
1.28.997	1.29.385	1.29.586	1.29.678	1.29.809	1.29.927	1.29.974	1.30.215	1.30.249	1.30.601	1.30.659