Leclerc recovers from spin to take stunning Spanish GP pole

Charles Leclerc delivered a remarkable final lap in qualifying for the Spanish Grand Prix to take pole position as Max Verstappen’s hopes were ended by a DRS issue.

Leclerc spun towards the end of his first struggle as he lost the rear inward the chicane, leaving him without a time on the workbench and provisionally P10 superiority of the final runs. Despite needing to get a lap on the board, Leclerc pulled out a stunning effort to post a 1:18.750 and go over 0.3s of Verstappen, who had set the pace initially.

While Leclerc was improving, Verstappen was unable to respond when his DRS didn’t unshut on the pit straight and he aborted his lap in Turn 3, but he will still start from second place on Sunday.

Carlos Sainz will start from third superiority of George Russell, with fourth the weightier result for Mercedes so far this season. However, without looking in the mix for pole throughout Q1 and Q2, Russell was over 0.6s off Leclerc and Mercedes didn’t squint a true threat in the final part of qualifying.

Sergio Perez is fifth on the grid without stuff on the when foot slightly from Q1.

Down in seventh at the time during the first part of qualifying, Perez wasn’t feeling confident and went for a second run early on in but ran through the gravel at Turn 8 and ruined his lap, leaving him facing a nervous wait. While he advanced, it meant he was slightly increasingly limited in terms of tire usage from then on, and only write-up Lewis Hamilton to P5 by 0.092s.

Valtteri Bottas was a similar margin overdue Hamilton in seventh while Kevin Magnussen’s eighth place was made plane increasingly impressive when the gap to Hamilton – 0.17s – and the fact that Haas is the only team not to bring any upgrades to the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. It was a strong showing from both Haas drivers, with Mick Schumacher in 10th place overdue Daniel Ricciardo.

Mercedes were on on fresh soft tires compared to used for the Red Bull and Ferrari for the first runs in Q2, and Russell and Hamilton duly set the pace early on surpassing slipping when overdue Verstappen and Sainz, but it at least gave them the luxury of not completing a second run.

The surprise in that session was the ongoing pace of Haas, and moreover the suppuration of Lando Norris without he was penalized for exceeding track limits on his final run and was demoted to 11th place, saving Schumacher. Norris joined Esteban Ocon, Yuki Tsunoda, Pierre Gasly and Guanyu Zhou in dropping out.

There were big names that dropped out in the first part of qualifying, too, as Fernando Alonso found himself up overdue Norris to start his final lap and unable to improve. The incident was noted by the stewards but then cleared and no remoter investigation carried out, leaving Alonso 17th on the grid.

Sebastian Vettel was just 0.074s yonder from a spot in Q2 and when informed he had been eliminated replied over team radio: “You must be kidding”, as Aston Martin’s upgrades failed to unhook a step forward in competitiveness.

Lance Stroll had once been involved in a tropical undeniability with Norris in the pit lane in which the Aston Martin released slantingly the McLaren and the two nearly make contact – with the stewards deciding to investigate without the session – surpassing he dropped out in P18, superiority of Alex Albon and Nicholas Latifi.