Oracle Red Bull Racing

Bulls Claim Row Two In Portimão Qualifying

Max to start P3 and Checo P4 ahead of Sunday's race.

Max and will line up on the second row of the grid for tomorrow’s Portuguese Grand Prix after qualifying P3 and P4 respectively at the end of a tricky qualifying session in Portimão.

Q1

When the opening segment of the hour-long session got underway Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz set the early pace with a lap 1:19.303. Max then opened with a solid first flying lap of 1:19.485 to take P2. That was beaten by Lewis Hamilton, but the Mercedes driver’s lap time was quickly deleted for exceeding track limits in turn one. The Mercedes driver dropped to the bottom of the order but soon jumped back to the upper reaches of the timesheet with his following lap.

Max, meanwhile, was not happy with the performance of his RB16B and during his next run complained of a lack of straight line speed. He headed back to the garage to make changes and after spending time in the pits eventually made it through to Q2 in P11.

Hills Are Alive With The Sound Of F1

It wasn’t a typically smooth session for Sergio either. The Mexican set good early pace with a lap of 1:19.337 that left him P3. He then sought to improve on that but heading into turn four, Sergio was caught out by the windy conditions and spun. He managed to keep going but relied on his early time to progress in P6 as Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas claimed top spot ahead of McLaren’s Lando Norris and Hamilton.

At the other end of the order, Daniel Ricciardo was the surprise faller at the first hurdle. The McLaren driver was edged out to P16 when Alpine’s Esteban Ocon put in a good lap to reach P4. And after making a mistake in turn 13 Ricciardo failed to recover and was eliminated ahead of Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll, Williams’ Nicholas Latifi and the Haas cars of Mick Schumacher and Nikita Mazepin.

Q2

In Q2 Max and Sergio went out on medium compound Pirellis, but both drivers appeared to struggle for outright pace on the yellow-banded tyres. Hamilton took top spot in the segment with a lap of 1:17.968 ahead of teammate Bottas with Norris P3 ahead of Ocon.

After the first runs Max and Checo sat in P5 and P6 respectively and the Bulls opted to send both out on soft tyres in case the pace of those behind them suddenly improved in the final runs. It didn’t, and both Bulls backed out of their laps in the final sector as it became clear that their opening medium-tyre times were safe enough to guarantee progress to Q3.

Eliminated at the end of the second segment, however, were Williams’ George Russell in a nonetheless impressive P11 ahead of Alfa Romeo’s Antonio Giovinazzi, Alpine’s Fernando Alonso, AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda and Alfa Romeo’s Kimi Räikkönen.

Checo Through The Trees

Q3

Max was one of the last out of pit lane at the start of Q3 and his first flying lap, a 1:18.209, put him at the top of the timesheet. His stay there was brief, however, as his time was quickly deleted for going beyond the track limits in turn four. At the end of the opening runs, as Bottas took provisional pole ahead of Hamilton and Checo, Max sat in P10.

With just one run left Max had it all to do and though he pushed to the limit, a downturn in track conditions meant he could only improve to P3 behind pole position man Bottas and second-place Hamilton.

Sergio’s final runs were more straightforward but in the tricky conditions the Mexican was forced to settle for P4 on the grid, 0.144s behind Max.

Behind the Bulls, Sainz will start in fifth place for Ferrari ahead of Ocon and Norris, with Charles Leclerc claiming P8 for Ferrari. Pierre Gasly with start ninth for AlphaTauri and Sebastian Vettel will start from P10 for Aston Martin.

Portuguese Grand Prix 2021: Qualifying

Bull On The Charge In Portimão

Max To Start P3 In Portugal

Checo On His Q3 Lap

Checo To Start Alongside Max In P4

Bull On The Brow Of The Hill

Through To Q3 On The Mediums

Getting Set For Qualifying

Not The Qualifying Max Wanted

All Eyes On The Data In Quali

Heading Out For Q2 On The Mediums

Getting Focussed Before The Session

Bulls Set To Charge On Sunday

WhatWasSaid:

Max

“Third is of course not what we wanted but it’s not too bad after I had a Q3 lap time deleted, which would actually have put us fastest even though I lost time with the snap at Turn 4. We struggled with the balance in Q1 and Q2 because of the track surface, and everyone is chasing grip, but we got to a decent level in Q3 so I don’t think we are too far off.

I think we are still competitive and it will be different in the race tomorrow.

Max Verstappen

"It was really one of those sessions where you could end up in P1 or P3 out of the blue. You could do a lap which was pretty good and then put another set of tyres on, and if you had just a little bit of a different out lap and tyre preparation, with the lack of grip around here it makes a big difference and is hard to predict. I think we are still competitive and it will be different in the race tomorrow. Our long runs have been ok and although it’s going to be hard to follow with the grip levels we will first focus on a clean start and then put the pressure on.”

Checo

“It wasn’t a great qualifying on my side, it was very messy in terms of finding my rhythm and so I’m not entirely happy with my lap time. I wasn’t very happy with the balance and I just struggled a lot so it’s a shame we weren’t able to qualify higher. This track is all about the tyres and getting them to the right temperature which is very difficult. I tried everything in terms of warm up with my out laps, build laps, push laps but nothing seemed to work.

"The conditions with the wind made it more tricky and they probably suited the Mercedes better but we still have a good starting position and a great opportunity tomorrow so anything can happen. I think it will be a tight battle around us so I’m looking forward to that. We just need to put the pressure on the Mercedes and hopefully we can fight for a podium.”

ChristianHorner

The medium tyres give us better strategy options in tomorrow’s race where we lock out the second row of the grid.

Christian Horner CBE

“It was a difficult qualifying session today, particularly with the very windy conditions, but both drivers progressed through to Q3 on the medium tyres which gives us better strategy options in tomorrow’s race where we lock out the second row of the grid. Max’s first run in Q3 was quick enough for pole but unfortunately his lap was deleted for track limits after a gust of wind at Turn 4 unsettled the car, causing him to run only millimetres wide. Max’s second and final run was then compromised by traffic so it was a rather frustrating third place for him.

Hopefully both cars can get a good launch and a clean run in tomorrow’s race to make life difficult for the two Mercedes in front.

Christian Horner CBE

"Checo did well meanwhile to recover from a little scare in Q1 after he briefly visited the gravel trap to take fourth alongside Max. Hopefully both cars can get a good launch and a clean run in tomorrow’s race to make life difficult for the two Mercedes in front.”

PortugueseGrandPrixQualifyingTop10

Position	Driver	Team	Time
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
Valtteri Bottas	Lewis Hamilton	Max Verstappen	Sergio Pérez	Carlos Sainz	Esteban Ocon	Lando Norris	Charles Leclerc	Pierre Gasly	Sebastian Vettel
Mercedes	Mercedes	Red Bull Racing Honda	Red Bull Racing Honda	Ferrari	Alpine	McLaren	Ferrari	AlphaTauri	Aston Martin
1.18.348	1.18.355	1.18.746	1.18.890	1.19.039	1.19.042	1.19.116	1.19.306	1.19.475	1.19.659