BUDAPEST, 30 Jul: George Russell won his first career Formula One pole with a fast final qualifying lap at the Hungarian Grand Prix on Saturday.
\nIt gave Mercedes its first pole of the season on the same day F1 champion and points leader Max Verstappen lost power and qualified a season-worst 10th.
\nRussell screamed in celebration after beating Ferrari drivers Carlos Sainz Jr. and Charles Leclerc to grab the first pole of his career.
\n\u201cWhooooo, come on! Yes! Hahahaha. You beauty! You beauty!\u201d yelled Russell before jumping into the arms of his engineers.
\nThe Mercedes pace was even more surprising given what Russell called a \u201cdisastrous\u201d second practice on Friday when Mercedes was about one second behind Leclerc\u2019s leading time.
\n\u201cFor us as a team it\u2019s massive. We were all here until 11 p.m. last night scratching our heads, and we all felt pretty lost,\u201d Russell said. \u201cTo come back and grab pole position is an amazing feeling. We absolutely nailed today, 100%.\u201d
\nVerstappen unleashed expletives as his qualifying bid was undone.
\nHe struggled with grip then complained of having \u201cno power … nothing works\u201d on his second attempt.
\nThe Hungaroring track, nestled amid rolling hills just outside of Budapest, dried out somewhat for afternoon qualifying following a huge downpour during the third practice.
\nLeclerc \u2014 who leads F1 with seven poles this season \u2014 crashed while leading the French GP last Sunday to hand Verstappen a win that gave the Dutchman a 63-point lead over Leclerc in the standings.
\nBut now Leclerc has an ideal chance to close the gap on Sunday on one of F1’s hardest tracks for passing.
\nVerstappen\u2019s Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez had a disappointing session and starts from 11th place.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s been a bad day,\u201d Perez said. \u201cIt\u2019s certainly going to be difficult to overtake tomorrow.\u201d
\nLando Norris of McLaren qualified fourth ahead of Esteban Ocon \u2014 last year\u2019s winner \u2014 Alpine teammate Fernando Alonso and Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton, who is F1’s record holder with 103 poles.
\nRussell, who replaced Valtteri Bottas at Mercedes this year, caught the eye driving for struggling backmarker Williams last year with an incredible performance in the wet to qualify second for the Belgian GP.
\n\u201cDare I say better than the Spa one? I don\u2019t think I\u2019ll ever have qualifying close to these two (results). But for pure driving, probably the one today,\u201d Russell said. \u201cThis is what racing\u2019s all about. This is why I want to become world champion.\u201d
\nAfter a first pole, the British driver is eyeing a first win.
\n\u201cHopefully we can drive off into the sunset tomorrow. I\u2019m already thinking of what I can do to win,\u201d he said. \u201cSaturday doesn\u2019t mean a huge amount, Sunday is when the points and prizes are won.\u201d
\nSainz called his form \u201cnothing special\u201d but conceded Russell \u201cdeserves that pole,\u201d while Leclerc said he \u201cstruggled massively in Q3\u201d because \u201cthe tires were definitely not in the right window.\u201d
\nAt least he has Verstappen where he wants him, seven cars back.
\n\u201cMax might take a few more laps to come to the front,\u201d Leclerc said.<\/p>\n
Wet Practice
\nDrivers had earlier tackled a difficult rain-drenched third practice.
\nAston Martin driver Sebastian Vettel lost the rear tires and went backward into the crash barriers, bringing out a red flag with about 10 minutes to go. The session restarted with four minutes left.
\nAfter the intense heat of Friday, rain began thundering down around midday and the Hungaroring was drenched by the 1 p.m. start.
\nThe Ferraris were the first to go out and Leclerc slid as he missed a chicane.
\nAs rain got even heavier and visibility worsened, Vettel \u2014 who is retiring at the end of the season \u2014 missed a turn and AlphaTauri\u2019s Pierre Gasly just avoided a crash barrier then later did a 360 spin.
\nRussell said he was \u201cstruggling a lot,\u201d Ricciardo spoke of having \u201cabsolutely no grip\u201d and Haas driver Mick Schumacher complained his rear tires felt like they were slipping on ice.
\nWilliams driver Nicholas Latifi surprised everyone by posting the fastest time on his final lap.
\n\u201cI was wondering if that clapping was for me,\u201d joked Latifi, who is last in the standings and yet to score a point.
\nThat joy was short-lived as the Canadian driver was among the five eliminated from Q1, along with Vettel and Gasly.
\n\u201cI\u2019m gutted,\u201d said Gasly, who had one of his lap times deleted for going off track limits, also at Turn 5.
\nLatifi starts last on Sunday. (AP)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
BUDAPEST, 30 Jul: George Russell won his first career Formula One pole with a fast final qualifying lap at the Hungarian Grand Prix on Saturday. It gave Mercedes its first pole of the season on the same day F1 champion and points leader Max Verstappen lost power and qualified a season-worst 10th. Russell screamed in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-196726","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=196726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196726\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=196726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=196726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=196726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}