For the second straight week, Friday Night Qualifying was held under the lights as the drivers looked to master a lap around the incredibly high-speed Jeddah Corniche Circuit!
Q1
In Qualifying 1; Valtteri Bottas, Esteban Ocon, Pierre Gasly, Logan Sargeant, and Zhou Guanyu were the five slowest drivers. Valtteri Bottas didn’t quite have enough pace to get his Kick Sauber into Q2 whilst the Alpine duo of Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly were about 3 tenths behind as Alpine’s struggles continued. It’s actually worth mentioning that Ocon beat Gasly by just 4 thousandths of a second! Logan Sargeant had a pretty horrible Qualifying as he was actually the slowest driver to set a lap time due to Zhou Guanyu failing to make the line after binning his car in the wall in FP3 (which isn’t great). Max Verstappen topped Q1 for Red Bull ahead of Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll who clearly seems to like the end of the first part of Quali!
Q2
In Qualifying 2; Oliver Bearman, Alex Albon, Kevin Magnussen, Daniel Ricciardo, and Nico Hulkenberg all failed to make it into the Top 10 shootout. Ollie Bearman, who was driving for Ferrari in place of the unwell Carlos Sainz, can be pretty pleased with his efforts as he was pretty close to making it into Q3 and 5 and a bit tenths behind your teammate isn’t too bad given the circumstances. Alex Albon also did a pretty good job to get P12 for Williams whilst Kevin Magnussen will start 13th for Haas after a decent session. Decent can not be to describe Daniel Ricciardo’s session though as Danny Ric was miles away from his teammate whilst Nico Hulkenberg was unfortunately unable to get a lap on the board due to a mechanical issue. Max Verstappen once again topped Q2, this time ahead of the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc.
Q3
In Qualifying 3, a blistering 1:27.472 was enough for Max Verstappen to take Pole Position by over 3 tenths of a second! It was one of those “Verstappen masterclass” laps and I’ll be honest, I don’t think we’ll see much of Max in the Race tomorrow. Charles Leclerc should be really pleased with a front-row start for Ferrari whilst Sergio Perez will have mixed feelings about P3. Fernando Alonso qualified a superb 4th for Aston Martin (and only half a tenth of P2) whilst Oscar Piastri did a great job to outqualify teammate Lando Norris as McLaren locked out the third row. George Russell made an error that cost him dear, but he still managed to beat teammate Lewis Hamilton who was nowhere in an ultimately disappointing day for Mercedes. Yuki Tsunoda will start P9 for Visa Cash App RB after a great Qualifying session whilst Lance Stroll should be disappointed with his result as the potential for a Top 6 start was very much there.
Starting Grid for the 2024 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix and My Qualifying Grades
Max Verstappen: 10
Charles Leclerc: 10
Sergio Perez: 8
Fernando Alonso: 10
Oscar Piastri: 8
Lando Norris: 6
George Russell: 5
Lewis Hamilton: 4
Yuki Tsunoda: 9
Lance Stroll: 4
Oliver Bearman: 7
Alex Albon: 7
Kevin Magnussen: 6
Daniel Ricciardo: 4
Nico Hulkenberg: -
Valtteri Bottas: 3
Esteban Ocon: 2
Pierre Gasly: 2
Logan Sargeant: 1
Zhou Guanyu: 1
My Predictions for the 2024 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix
Max Verstappen
Sergio Perez
Charles Leclerc
George Russell
Lando Norris
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