McLaren Locks Front Row at Zaandvort, Oscar Piastri on Pole

Break’s over and Oscar Piastri came back guns blazing, winning Pole Position for the Dutch Grand Prix Qualifying. The McLaren driver felt right at home at Zandvoort, setting a record-breaking 1:08:662 fast lap.

Championship runner-up Lando Norris will start second on Sunday (Aug. 31) as the gap with his teammate narrows down to only 9 points. The local hero, Max Verstappen, was unable to split the McLarens and will start on third position.

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Q3

Last session at Zandvoort, the fight for pole was on and only the McLaren drivers were invited, the rest could fight for second.

The two papaya drivers fought the entire sessions with lap times ever so close with each other and far from the rest, a display of their impressive engineering dominance this season.

It was the last minute and Norris was pushing his MCL39 to the limit, but despite an incredible effort, he lost to Piastri by an outlandish 0.012s. We would later find that Piastri’s lap was no common effort; he had in fact, broken the track record with his lightning 1:08.662 lap time. Given the odds, the reigning champion had to settle for third on home turf.

On fourth position, rookie Isaack Hadjar was on the attack and stole the position from George Russell in the last lap, demoting the Britton to fifth. Sixth and seventh position were claimed by Ferrari drivers Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton, respectively.

The bottom of the top 10 finds Liam Lawson on eighth, Carlos Sainz on ninth, and a disappointed Fernando Alonso on 10th.

Q2

The second qualifying session was largely uneventful with all drivers behaving out on the track. The crowd, however, was certainly cheerful out in the sun, especially whenever the local hero Verstappen flown by the grandstands.

The session came to a tight close in one of the smallest and narrow circuits of the calendar, where an impossible 0.021 had Kimi Antonelli missing Q3 and out in in 16th position. Yuki Tsunoda and Gabriel Bortoletto had almost the same lap time, eliminated in 17th and 18th, respectively.

Pierre Gasly qualified 14th and Alex Albon in 15th, with multiple complains heard over the Williams radio due to the poor tyre decision.

Q1

The sport resumed at Zandvoort with the first qualifying session after the summer break, but the struggles for Aston Martin were not left behind.

After an impressive shunt at turn 3 during FP2 on Friday, Lance Stroll lost the rear again just three minutes after Q1 start in Turn 13, going straight to the wall. He did manage to get the car out of the gravel and to his garage, but he was never getting back from the pits

The clock run out of time and Franco Colapinto was the first driver in the drop zone, losing to rookie star Gabriel Bortoletto for a mere 0.06s gap between him. Behind Colapinto was Bortoletto’s teammate, Nico Hulkenberg, in 17th position and the two Haas drivers in 18th and 19th.

Stroll starts last, unable to set a lap time before crashing.

The F1 Dutch Grand Prix will begin on Sunday, Aug. 31 at 9:00 a.m. ET. Television coverage in the United States will be provided by ESPN.

Maximo Brignardello

F1 Newswriter | maximobrignar@gmail.com | Website