“A great start for tomorrow,” Max Verstappen pleased with pole position and Red Bull front-row lockout in Abu Dhabi
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Max Verstappen after sealing pole position at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix (IMAGO / Motorsport Images)
Max Verstappen will start in pole position for the last race of the season in Abu Dhabi, beating out teammate Sergio Perez by 0.152 seconds, and this year’s pole trophy winner, Charles Leclerc, by 0.240 seconds. This is the Dutchman’s third pole position in a row here, and he has won the previous two races.
The man on pole has won all of the last seven races held in Abu Dhabi, and Verstappen definitely seems poised to extend that tally. If he triumphs (yet again) in Abu Dhabi, it’ll be his fifteenth race win of the season – a record which will take quite some beating. Records are really the only thing Verstappen is (himself) fighting for as the Yas Marina circuit – he and his team have sealed both championships.
Speaking to David Coulthard after the session, he recapped his session: “It was a bit of an up-and-down qualifying, you know. [It] started off quite well, [but] Q2 was a little bit messy. I don’t know why but with the tyres, I just couldn’t get the grip together, but then in Q3, it all felt a little bit more normal. We had a bit of a scare – the car turned off before the first run, [so we had to] reboot everything.”
He also expressed his happiness about the Red Bull front-row lockout with Sergio Perez: “Then we went out and both of the laps were good enough, so of course, very pleased with that but also very happy that both cars are on the front row. Because, of course we want to win the race, but we also want to finish second with Checo [Perez] in the championship. So, that’s [the qualifying result] a great start for tomorrow.”
Max Verstappen still expecting a ‘good battle’ on race day
The only thing to really fight for, apart from extending records, is Sergio Perez’s P2 finish in the Driver’s championship, which Christian Horner previously stated is a ‘priority’ for the team after Max Verstappen had ‘ignored’ team orders and not let Perez past towards the end of the Brazilian Grand Prix. The team have also made it clear that they will do everything in their power to help Perez achieve his goal.
The Dutchman did give a little bit of help to Perez in qualifying, which when referred to by the interviewer (and cited that Red Bull are ‘perfectly’ poised to control the race’), Verstappen replied: “Yeah, I mean, it always sounds great. But for sure, today was amazing. I still expect it to be a good battle tomorrow, but at least we have both cars there and we can do what we want.”
Perez and Charles Leclerc are level on points, so even if Verstappen wins, the important thing is to just keep Leclerc behind his teammate. It’ll be interesting to see how Red Bull decide to go about this during the race.
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Aniket Tripathi
(1002 Articles Published)