Turkish Grand Prix – Max Verstappen was disappointed after losing out on pole position to Lance Stroll in for tomorrow’s Grand Prix.
Verstappen had been dominating Formula 1’s return to the Istanbul Park Circuit, comfortably setting the pace in the practice sessions before going two seconds faster than anyone else in the difficult conditions of Q1 and Q3.
The Dutchman started Q3 in the same fashion but after Red Bull saw that Sergio Perez had jumped to the top of the timesheets on the intermediate tyre, they decided to follow suit. Verstappen had been on another fast lap, and improving on his first go but the team called him into the pits instead of completing it and made the tyre swap.
Unlike the Racing Points, Verstappen couldn’t find the grip on the intermediates and while he did manage to beat Perez’ time, he wasn’t able to challenge the other Racing Point of Lance Stroll, and missed the chance to be the first non-Mercedes to take pole this season.
“Already in Q1 when we tried to go out on the [intermediate tyres] we had no grid,” said Verstappen. “And the track was a lot better in Q3 but for us the inters were horrible. Whereas the extreme tyres were good, it was very comfortable. Yeah…not good.”
Depending on the outcome of Stroll’s steward’s investigation into whether the Canadian slowed under yellow flags during the session or not, Verstappen might still inherit the pole but as it stood after the chequered flag fell in the session, the Red Bull driver was very disappointed with the day.
“At the moment I’m a bit disappointed of course. The race tomorrow we can do well but when you are first all the time and you come out second, it’s not what you want. Points are tomorrow so I just hope we’ll have a good race.”
