By Melody Gross 
Max Verstappen secured his fifth consecutive pole position in 2023. Red Bull once again confirmed the favouritism, but the highlight was McLaren who managed to put Lando Norris in second and Oscar Piastri in third. A great performance by the McLaren guys, who were ahead of Ferrari (Charles Leclerc fourth and Carlos Sainz fifth) and ahead of Mercedes (George Russell sixth, Lewis Hamilton seventh). Alex Albon, Fernando Alonso and Pierre Gasly completed the top ten.
Eligible movie
Q1
Silverstone played a prank on the thousands of fans who went to watch the playoffs live and looked gray covered by a sea of water-filled clouds. With a 100% chance of rain during the course, with 22.3°C track temperature and 20.9°C air temperature, and 79% humidity, the conditions will demand plenty of attention and care from the drivers.
The first minutes of qualifying were busy with the Mercedes positioning themselves in the top positions in the pit lane, while there were still two minutes left for the green light. There was a mixed bag of tire choices, with some opting for the soft tyres, others choosing the medium tyres. Most of the riders opted to go out on soft tyres, with the exception of Leclerc, Sainz, Sargeant, Magnussen and Hulkenberg who opted for green-flagged tyres. The track was dry enough and Leclerc asked to return to the pits to fit the soft tyres.
The first laps were cautious, with Lewis Hamilton spinning and escaping the gravel pit, showing how little grip he had at this point.
The first times are set in 34th second, with Max Verstappen entering second 33rd, at a time when we no longer have intermediate tires on the track. Fernando Alonso reached 31st with 12 seconds left in the session. Verstappen saw his time erased by the track limits, but on the next lap he was back in second place. Lando Norris moved up to third, with Leclerc moving up to second. With time it decreases dramatically at this point. George Russell moved to the top of the table. Alonso again lowered the benchmark and was the first to enter 30 seconds, taking 0.6-tenths of Russell’s time.
At this point, Carlos Sainz, Valtteri Bottas, Alex Albon and Kevin Magnussen were in the elimination zone, with the drop still to come.
With six minutes to go, it rained softly, without the drivers feeling the need to change tyres. Verstappen had already taken 0.011 seconds, ahead of Alonso and was leading, but with the rain it looked hard to improve on the times.
Three minutes before the session started, Magnussen’s car stopped in the middle of the track, with the red flag shown. Exiting the pit lane was Sergio Pérez, who was 14th, with only three minutes left to get away from the exclusion zone. As Max Verstappen was preparing to join the line forming at the exit of the pits, he touched the pit lane wall and damaged his front wing. The rain stopped during the break and so there was a chance for the riders to improve their records. But with just 3 minutes to go, the drivers would only have one lap to go to earn a spot in Q2. Times improved a lot and Albon moved to the top of the table, being knocked out by Lando Norris shortly afterwards.
Valtteri Bottas was stuck in the track near the end of the session, spoiling his lap at the back of the queue. Thus Perez, Tsunoda, Cho, De Vries and Magnussen were eliminated in the first quarter. Lando Norris got the best time, in a session that decided on the last lap and with many clashes on the track for the best position, especially between Hamilton and Verstappen.
Q2
If the rain spoiled things in Q1, in Q2 the sun came out and helped dry out the track. Once again, a row of single-seaters set up in the pit lane, with rain again threatening, even though the sun had begun to rise.
Alonso was the first to put time on the table, coming on in the 30th minute, shortly after he was taken off by Lando Norris, followed by Carlos Sainz, Esteban Ocon, George Russell and Charles Leclerc. Verstappen was only third behind Pierre Gasly, who managed to improve the Dutchman’s time shortly afterwards.
Fernando Alonso emerged again and set the best time, with Alex Albon taking second place (+0.100 seconds). Leclerc, Norris and Gasly followed suit.
Logan Sargeant and Lance Stroll, who had set times to secure the top ten positions, had their laps erased for going over the track limits.
With five minutes to go, Oscar Piastri was leading the leaderboard, followed by Verstappen and Alonso, and times fell faster than ever. In the elimination zone we had Russell. Hulkenberg, Stroll, Sargeant and Bottas (who did not participate in the session). Hamilton took 0.022 seconds. To Piastri’s time, Norris managed to shave half a second off his compatriot’s time, in a session that promised more surprises.
No one seemed to match Norris’ time, with Alex Albon 0.025 seconds behind. McLaren driver time. Vertappen managed to get into the 22nd, when the checkered flag was shown. Pastry ended up entering second place.
Hulkenberg, Stroll, Ocon, Sargeant, and Bottas were eliminated in the second quarter. The top five finishers in this session were Verstappen, Piastri, Norris, Albon and Sainz. He was followed by Leclerc, Alonso, Hamilton, Gasly and Russell.
Q3
As in Q1 and Q2, the teams didn’t want to wait and took to the track as soon as it was cleared, trying to escape the imminent danger of rain, even though the sun was still peeking through the clouds. In Q2 Verstappen, McLarens, Albon and Sainz were the fastest, but the track was getting more and more dry and Max Verstappen seemed to be the big favourite.
Lewis Hamilton was the first to sit on pole, but Verstappen (the only one with fresh tyres) tried to take more than half a second off the Mercedes driver’s time. Oscar Piastri took the third time, followed by Leclerc and Sainz.
The final laps will be on new tires for everyone which could make for an exciting end to qualifying.
With three minutes left in the session, the cars were back on the track for the last few attempts, with Verstappen staying last, while the Ferraris and Mercedes were at the top of the queue. Leclerc made his last effort at the start but was unable to dethrone Verstappem with Sainz third and Russell fourth. Verstappen managed to improve his record, confirming first place, but the highlight was Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri who took second and third places, an excellent result for McLaren. The Ferrari and Mercedes pairings followed, with Albon ahead of Alonso and Gasly.
Under update
Photo: Martin Trinkler