Max Verstappen said he was “very happy” despite being beaten to Dutch Grand Prix pole position by a much faster Lando Norris lap.
The Briton upstaged his rival with a mega lap at Zandvoort. Despite driving around the second-shortest circuit on the Formula 1 calendar, Norris managed to go more than three-tenths of a second quicker than the best time managed by Verstappen.
It was a remarkable lap from the McLaren driver to which the championship leader had no reply. And while the smile was still on Verstappen’s face, he admitted that Red Bull no longer have the pace to be able to put in the times that he would like to.
He said: “It is how it is at the moment. The car is not the easiest to drive, but the lap was quite solid, only in turns 11 and 12 was it a bit difficult, but hopefully the car is okay in the race. We will give it a good go, but of course when you are more than three-tenths behind in qualifying, you have to be realistic.
“In the whole qualifying, we just lacked a bit of pace and I tried the best I could. I’m still very happy to be on the front-row, it was tricky out there with the wind, and the gusts coming in so every single lap felt different. You couldn’t really go off reference, but I am happy with second, especially after yesterday, it is a good result.”
Not as happy as Norris, who secured the fourth pole position of his F1 career with one of the very best laps he has ever produced on a Saturday. He put a single finger up into the air to signify what he had done after climbing out of his McLaren.
And as he took part in his post-session interview, the delighted Briton said: “The car was feeling amazing! We’ve got some upgrades on the car for the first time in a while and everything is working very well, so a big thanks to the team.”
Asked if he can hold off Verstappen, Norris replied: “I’m excited for tomorrow. I’m sure it’s going to be tough, Max has been very quick all weekend. I know we got him today, but he’s still second and he’s going to put up a good fight, especially at his home race. I’m looking forward to it.”
Oscar Piastri will line up third on the the grid to further delight everyone in the McLaren garage. Chief executive Zak Brown was beaming and declared: “We have the pace to win.”
George Russell was fourth quickest and admitted afterwards that it was probably the best result he could have hoped for. In any case, it was a lot more than his team-mate Lewis Hamilton managed as the seven-time F1 champion was only 12th quickest in Q2 and also faces the threat of a further grid drop as he is investigated over allegedly blocking Sergio Perez on track.
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