Six of the six pole positions this year have gone to Verstappen, beating Leclerc by a tenth and a half in Miami

Max Verstappen remains unbeaten in Miami, in the sixth three-day race of Formula 1 this year, where after pole position and victory in the Sprint, tonight he won the pole in the main Grand Prix on Sunday (5/05, 23:00) – which will achieve This is his fifth win this year.

Next to him in the front row will be Charles Leclerc, who once again proved to be the Dutchman’s closest competitor during these three days. The second row will be shared by the other Ferrari and Red Bull drivers led by Carlos Sainz and Sergio Perez, who left the McLaren of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri in third place.

Significantly improved, compared to yesterday and with the Sprint, Mercedes featured George Russell and Lewis Hamilton, while for the first time this year Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso was excluded from the top ten – leaving the fifth row from the start to Nico Hulkenberg and Yuki Tsunoda of Haas and RB respectively. .

In tonight’s third qualifying session (Q3), none of the leading drivers, apart from Perez, were ultimately able to better the time he set on his first attempt – and neither did Verstappen (despite setting the fastest lap on the first section of the track). He was 0.14 inches ahead of Leclerc and about a tenth behind Saint.

This also shows the difficulty today’s drivers have in heating up the soft rubber and managing the soft rubber to stay within its thermal window in a single round of qualifying testing – without overheating. Alex Albon’s words were that this rubber only works in the first 6 of the track’s 19 turns.

Lando Norris also eventually took fifth place from his McLaren counterpart Oscar Piastri, despite initially going out in Q3 on the medium tire – which was very fast yesterday in Sprint qualifying.

For Mercedes, a double entry into Q3, even on the fourth row on the grid, was an encouraging result – especially considering that Hamilton managed to go faster on the medium tire than his (bad) first lap on the soft tyre. Lewis and Russell both ran second laps on the medium tyre, after the other sets of soft material ran out.

In Q2 alongside the two Aston Martins, which were unrecognizable in Miami (with Alonso qualifying just 0.01 inch clear of Q1 over Bottas’ Sauber team), both Alpines were eliminated along with Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon (whose entry The double in the second section is very encouraging.) And so is Williams Albon.

Finally, Daniel Ricciardo’s exit from Q1 was completely unexpected after his impressive performance in the Sprint Race. However, the Australian carries a Chinese Grand Prix penalty for overtaking under the safety car, so will start last in tomorrow’s Grand Prix, Easter Sunday at 23:00. Stay tuned to SPORT24’s live coverage of this match.