Round 14/23: Review of the Dutch Grand Prix qualifying

Once again, Max Verstappen clinched the pole position at the Dutch Grand Prix, his 8^th in the season and the 3^rd straight one at his home Grand Prix. It was, however, not as straightforward with the McLaren duo of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri claiming the provisional pole and P2 before a master class from Max at the end to claim the pole by over five-tenths of a second.

Coming out of the summer break, the Haas drivers of Nico Hulkenberg and Kevin Magnussen renewed their contract for the 2024 season. Elsewhere, Daniel Ricciardo fractured his wrist in FP2 leading to the highly hyped reserve driver Liam Lawson replacing him for the weekend. With a wet-dry session in store, for a rookie, it is probably not the ideal way to start his career. Let us find out how the drivers fared in the qualifying session beginning with Q1.

Q1

The qualifying session started on intermediates on a slippery track. The teams and the drivers were looking to improve with every lap as the track continued to dry out. Alex Albon in the Williams started the session with a 1:31 and with every lap the times tumbled making the last lap irrelevant. Q1 however was not without incidents as many drivers kept losing grip. Alex, Max, and Charles Leclerc found themselves in the gravel at various stages of the session.

It was the Williams of Alex and Logan Sargeant, the Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton and George Russell, the McLarens of Lando and Oscar, and Max trading the top spot for most of the qualifying. With rain arriving during the last few minutes of the session, there were two clear strategies that were emerging on the circuit. One, pit for new inters and try to get the optimum tire temperature to do one final hot lap which most of the teams went with. Second, stay on the used inters and get in a push lap before the rain intensifies and makes any improvement impossible. Both the Mercedes, the Red Bulls, and the Alpine of Esteban Ocon opted for this strategy.

Carlos Sainz almost drove into the side of Oscar while coming out of the pits which resulted in him getting a reprimand. With the clock ticking down, both the Ferraris and Lewis were in the drop zone on different strategies hoping to make it out of Q1. Lewis did make his strategy of staying out work by finishing P12 and Carlos by finishing P5. Esteban Ocon couldn’t go as early as he hoped and with rain intensifying the scope of improvement on his old tyres was gone, finishing in P17. Charles, however, had a very tight finish making it into Q2 by just under half a tenth of a second. At the end of Q1, Charles was visibly angry with the team and was heard expressing his disappointment with the team's calls.

The Alfa Romeos of Zhou Guanyu and Valtteri Bottas finished P16 and P19 and couldn’t show their pace from earlier in the weekend in the wet session. Kevin finished in P18 while Nico once again marched into Q2 with a P11. Liam finished P20 as he couldn’t find the pace when it was required. He was within a second of the pace of Yuki Tsunoda for most of the session which in itself is a good start in an unknown car.

Q2

With the rain coming up at the end of Q1, we were again back on inters territory, and at least for Q2, the gamble of taking slicks at some point in the session was nonexistent. Max started the session by putting in a 1:21.921 and was consistently at the top. The track was again improving at a rapid rate with the rain gone.

The drivers started pitting after their initial runs and Carlos Sainz in P15 was seen running on used inters to try and burn his fuel so that he could do one final push lap after pitting. As the drivers emerged out of the pits, both the Ferraris were in the drop zone & were looking to go at the end, hoping for the best conditions on the track. Lewis was on P9 but couldn’t improve on his time on the last flying lap. With every other driver improving, Lewis could only finish P13 going out in Q2 while George finished in P6.

The Ferraris of Charles and Carlos could safely make it into the Q3 but it was Logan Sargeant who made the most of the drying track by finishing P10. It was his first-ever Q3 appearance and is the first American to do so in the last 30 years after Michael Andretti in 1993. Lance Stroll, Pierre Gasly missed it out and Lewis missed it out by less than a tenth of a second finishing in P11, P12, and P13 respectively. Yuki finished in P14 but received a three-place grid penalty for impeding Lewis earlier in the session. Nico Hulkenberg couldn’t produce anything significant finishing in P15.

Q3

A dry line started emerging on the track by the end of Q2 but the rest of the track including the pitlane was wet. This meant that maintaining tire temperature was critical and difficult when off the racing line. The teams were again found to be split in strategies here as George, Alex, Carlos and Logan came out on softs while Sergio Perez, Max, Oscar and Charles were out on intermediates. However, on the out-lap, it was clear that softs were the right choice, and the drivers on inters pitted immediately for softs.

Alex set the pace with a flying lap of 1:15 on softs while his teammate Logan managed a 1:16 but however crashed on his cool-down lap bringing in the first red flag of the session. The session resumed with 8 minutes to go and this meant that there were still 2 push laps possible. On the first try, it was Lando and Oscar who set the pace ahead of Max taking the provisional pole and the front row for McLaren. Fernando Alonso was on a flyer having recorded the best Sector 1 time but it was not to be as Charles crashed bringing out the second red flag of the session.

On the final run, it was Max who went on the hot lap first and improved on the time set by Lando earlier by over 1.4 seconds. Lando Norris seemed to gain a tenth on Max after Sector 1 but thereafter faded in comparison finishing behind by over 5 tenths. Alex finished on P4, the best ever he has qualified in the Williams as George just edged him out of P3. Fernando finished in P5 whereas Sergio finished in P7 a whopping 1.3 seconds of the pace of his teammate and behind the Ferrari of Carlos in P6. Oscar had a very poor sector 3 which resulted him in finishing P8 ahead of Charles and Logan in P9 and 10 who couldn’t set up a time in the final run.

References

1. Image Credits: www.formula1.com
2. Thumbnail Image Credits: www.formula1.com

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