Verstappen secures Pole Position for US Grand Prix Sprint Race
AUSTIN, TX – Max Verstappen of Red bull Racing claimed pole position for the sprint race at the US Grand Prix in Austin, Texas, narrowly edging out McLaren’s Lando Norris in qualifying. The sprint race winner will earn eight points, with points decreasing to one for eighth place.
The qualifying session saw a surprising performance from Sauber‘s Nico Hulkenberg, achieving his first top-ten qualification of the year and marking the team’s best result of the season. This surpasses teammate Gabriel Bortoleto’s seventh-place grid position in Hungary in early August.Verstappen’s pole position sets the stage for a competitive sprint race ahead of Sunday’s main Grand Prix event.
Norris acknowledged Red Bull’s recent pace advantage, stating, “disappointed not to be on pole but not a surprise for us to be just a bit slower than the Red Bull lately. A little couple of bits here and there I could have improved on and caught a few bumps a little bit wrong, that’s the difficulty of this track. Or else, all happy.”
mclaren’s Oscar Piastri qualified in third, despite admitting to a challenging lap. “A pretty scruffy lap. Just didn’t really get it together. In some ways, I feel a bit fortunate to be third.The pace in the car is good. It’s nothing major, just been a bit of a messy lap and hopefully I can tidy it up tommorow,” Piastri said.
hulkenberg expressed his satisfaction with the result, saying, “Satisfied, happy, as you might imagine. P1 looked too good to be true. We weren’t sure if it was the real deal but we were able to continue that trend. Hopefully we can hang on to it this weekend. The pace was just there. The car seemed to be fast and in a good window,hit the sweet spot,I think that’s all.”
