The sun may have been shining but the blustery winds barrelling in over the dunes on the edge of the North Sea delivered a buffeting that might just have been enough to play a decisive factor in the absolutely minuscule margins in qualifying for the Dutch Grand Prix that divide the two Formula One title protagonists this season. It was Oscar Piastri who took a slender advantage over his McLaren teammate Lando Norris, in what remains an absolutely nip-and-tuck contest as the title run-in begins.
Max Verstappen in the Red Bull did his best to push the McLaren duo but really this was another startling demonstration of their complete stranglehold on the season. The pair have been on top all weekend, with Norris quickest in all three practice sessions. When it mattered, though, it was Piastri who had the edge, pipping his teammate to pole by 12 thousandths of a second, barely a breath between them.
Such margins may yet decide this championship. Piastri leads Norris by nine points, they have five poles apiece, with the Australian on six wins to Norris’s five. With ten meetings remaining, every edge counts now and Piastri has his nose in front for Sunday on a circuit where making up places is tricky indeed.
“The hardest guy to normally overtake is your teammate,” said Norris. “Especially when in a quali like today we’re split by one hundredth of a second. It’s going to take some magic.”
That is especially true given how evenly the two drivers are matched in a field of their own at the front. Indeed, even with Verstappen wrestling far more than might reasonably be expected from his recalcitrant Red Bull, still struggling with the grip and balance problems which have beset it all season, he was more than two tenths back in third, while Racing Bulls’ Isack Hadjar was half a second back in fourth. The rookie delivered a fine run to take a career-best place.
At the very sharp end, however, this was only ever a two-horse race, as is the title fight. The pairs’ times were all but interchangeable as they charged round the short, testing challenge in Zandvoort, which requires absolute precision for a quick time.
Piastri had the better of the first sector, Norris the second, and choosing between them was all but impossible until the clock stopped. The Australian held the edge over the line on his first hot run with a time of 1min 08.662sec and, while both pushed for their second runs, neither could improve.
Piastri was as composed as ever, pleased with what was some clinical execution, and Norris conceded he had been well beaten, admitting he had not reached the limit quite consistently enough but emphasised that the margins had been tiny.
“With a wind like this, a lot of it’s down to luck as well,” the Briton said. “I made a good lap in the first run of Q3 but just a smaller headwind down the straight on the final one, and I lost like one hundredth, so you could easily say that was that …”
The pole, Piastri’s first at Zandvoort, is another strong statement and something of a return to form over the single lap by the young Australian: it was his first since the Spanish GP in June demonstrating once more that he is a formidable opponent, with a steely resilience.
Piastri will also be confident he can maintain his title lead in the Netherlands. At Spa, where the Australian went on to win, he passed Norris for the lead on the opening lap, making the most of his slipstream from second on the grid, but he was then disappointed when Norris pulled off a strategic coup in Hungary to win before the summer break. The momentum has certainly been with Norris, with three wins from the last four races, and Piastri will want to exploit pole and stamp his authority on the title fight once more.
1. Oscra Piastri (McLaren) 1:08.662
2. Lando Norris (McLaren) 1:08.674
3. Max Verstappen (Red Bull) 1:09.925
4. Isack Hadjar (Racing Bulls) 1:09.208
5. George Russell (Mercedes) 1:09.255
6. Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) 1:09.340
7. Lewis Hamilton (Ferrari) 1:09.390
8. Liam Lawson (Racings Bulls) 1:09.500
9. Carlos Sainz Jr (Williams) 1:09.505
10. Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin) 1:09.630
11. Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes) 1:09.493
12. Yuki Tsunoda (Red Bulls) 1:09.622
13. Gabriel Bortoleto (Sauber) 1:09.622
14. Pierre Gasly (Alpine) 1:09.637
15. Alex Albon (Williams) 1:09.652
16. Franco Colapinto (Alpine) 1:10.104
17. Nico Hülkenberg (Sauber) 1:10.195
18. Esteban Ocon (Haas) 1:10.197
19. Oliver Bearman (Haas) 1:10.262
20. Lance Stroll (Aston Martin) (no time set)
“It felt good and like a good improvement from pretty much every other lap I did this weekend,” he said. “So it was nice to be able to pull it out but it took a lot of hard work, some patience in trying to find the time, and eventually I got there.”
George Russell was in fifth for Mercedes, with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc in sixth, the Monegasque driver surprised by an adventurous fox dashing by his Ferrari during one of his laps.
Lewis Hamilton took seventh for Ferrari in what he had hoped to be something of a reset to his season after the summer break. Having spun in two practice sessions, Hamilton enjoyed at least a more solid run during qualifying, albeit with him and Leclerc almost seven tenths off the lead, and the seven-time champion felt positive about his evolving relationship with Ferrari.
“Yesterday the car was a bit unpredictable and I think we made some changes, maybe the wind makes it a little bit difficult as well,” he said. “But I think we were looking for progress and I feel like I have had that this weekend, I’ve not been in Q3 for some time, so I am grateful for that.
“It definitely feels like it’s been one of the most solid couple of days so far of the year. That’s to do with some of the improvements of the process, my approach, it’s just a little calmer overall.”
