Norris breaks Dutch hearts with emphatic Zandvoort pole

Lando Norris dominated qualifying in Zandvoort, breaking Dutch hearts by beating home favorite Max Verstappen to top spot by almost 0.4s. Norris took provisional pole with his first lap, but Verstappen struck back with his second run, moving to top spot by a slender 0.045 seconds after setting only two of three personal best sectors. Norris, however, wasn’t to be beaten. Stringing together purple sectors in the first and last splits, he lowered the benchmark to 1m 09.673s, obliterating Verstappen by 0.356s for the fourth pole of his career and his third of the season. “An amazing day,” he said. “It’s nice to be back and start with a pole. “I’m excited for tomorrow. I’m sure it’s going to be tough. Max has been quick all weekend. I know we got him today, but he’s still second. He’s going to be putting up a good fight, especially at his home race, so I’m looking forward to it.” Verstappen was satisfied with second after looking further off the pace during Friday practice, but he was noncommittal about the odds of him extending his unbeaten run at Zandvoort. “I think the whole qualifying we just lacked a bit of pace,” he said. “I tried the best I could. “I’m happy with second. I think after yesterday as well this was a good result. “Of course when you’re more than 0.3s behind in qualifying, you have to be realistic. I’ll just try to have a good race tomorrow.” Oscar Piastri looked like a pole contender in the second McLaren until the final runs, when a scrappy lap left him 0.499s slower than his session-topping teammate, qualifying third. “I just didn’t do a good enough job,” he said. “A little bit disappointing not to be a bit higher up, but we’ve still got a good race car underneath us and we can get some really good points and hopefully a trophy tomorrow.” George Russell will start fourth for Mercedes ahead of Sergio Perez, 0.571s and 0.743s off the pace respectively. Charles Leclerc will line up sixth ahead of Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso and the superb Alex Albon, who took Williams to Q3 for just the fourth time this season and the first time since the British Grand Prix in July. Lance Stroll qualified ninth ahead of Pierre Gasly, who earnt only the third top-10 qualifying appearance of the year. Carlos Sainz will line up 11th after a difficult build-up to his weekend. The Spaniard lost almost all FP2, the only fully dry practice session of the weekend, to gearbox problems, meaning the first time he used the soft-compound tire was in Q1. He missed out on a spot in Q3 by 0.069s, but the Ferrari driver still managed to outqualify Lewis Hamilton, who will line up alongside him on the sixth row in 12th. Hamilton failed to set personal best times in the first or third sectors on his final flying lap, though combining his best splits would have moved him up only one place to 11th. Compounding the Briton’s afternoon will be a post-session stewards investigation into an impeding incident ahead of Perez in Q1. Yuki Tsunoda will start 13th for RB ahead of Haas teammates Nico Hulkenberg and Kevin Magnussen. Daniel Ricciardo will line up 16th, the Australian RB driver more than 0.11s short of a Q2 berth. Esteban Ocon was knocked out 17th – “Car’s a disaster since the beginning of the weekend,” he radioed angrily to his pit wall – ahead of Sauber teammates Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu. Logan Sargeant failed to take part in qualifying after his monster FP3 crash earlier in the day, with the team running out of time after valiantly attempting to repair the car.