Oscar Piastri finally snapped his three-month qualifying drought by grabbing pole position for the Qatar sprint race. After struggling to even make the front row since his Dutch Grand Prix pole in August, the Australian looked sharp from the first lap on Friday. He said it felt great to be back on top, especially after a string of messy sessions where he kept starting lower than he wanted.
Piastri’s pole came at the perfect time, with him tied on points with Max Verstappen and 24 behind teammate Lando Norris in the title fight. Starting ahead of Norris in third and Verstappen in sixth gives him a real shot to chip away at those gaps in the sprint. He admitted his lap wasn’t perfect with a couple of scruffy moments, but it was still enough to edge out the field by a small margin.
Norris had pace but couldn’t put it together on his final run. He got caught in traffic from Alex Albon on his out-lap, which messed up his rhythm, and then he went wide in the last corner anyway. That mistake opened the door for George Russell to sneak into second, marking Mercedes’ best qualifying in a while. Russell was surprised himself after being P14 in practice earlier.
Verstappen had a nightmare session, finishing sixth after complaining about bad bouncing and understeer all day. It was his worst qualifying of the season, and for the first time in over a year, he got beaten by teammate Yuki Tsunoda. Tsunoda looked confident and clean, saying he’s building momentum, but it might be too late to save his Red Bull seat next year.
Pirelli warned teams about tyre wear after finding deep cuts in several sets from gravel getting kicked up on the kerbs. With a 25-lap limit per tyre for safety, Sunday’s race could turn into a strategy battle. Most drivers will have just one fresh medium left after the sprint, so they’ll have to decide between used mediums, softs, or the slower hards. It could shake up the order big time if someone gets it right.
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