Oscar Piastri beat title rival Lando Norris in a thrilling battle for pole position at the Dutch Grand Prix as the British driver conceded he will require some “magic” to win the race on Sunday.
Piastri delivered a sensational lap to beat McLaren team-mate Norris by just 0.012 seconds and claim his fifth pole of the season.
Norris has won three of the last four races to close within nine points of team-mate Piastri in the drivers’ championship with 10 rounds remaining.
The 25-year-old had returned from the summer break in commanding fashion, topping all three practice sessions, but – as so often this season – Australian Piastri found the answer when he needed it.
Here's how the drivers line-up for Sunday's race 👀#F1 #DutchGP pic.twitter.com/bfopyrP5KA
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Norris laid down a marker in Q2 with a Zandvoort lap record but Piastri bettered that with his first run in Q3, to sit 12 thousandths of a second ahead of his team-mate.
Neither could improve on their final runs, leaving Norris – who overtook Max Verstappen to win at Zandvoort 12 months ago – with the task of getting past his title rival in Sunday’s race.
“Max was in a much slower car last year,” Norris said.
“The hardest guy to overtake is your team-mate. It’s going to take some magic or some good strategy.
“It’s difficult to overtake in the first place but even harder when it’s your team-mate. I’ll see what I can do.”
Piastri was able to turn the tables on Norris after his team-mate dominated practice, improving throughout the sessions on his way to the pole lap in a blistering time of 1.08.662.
“That was the definition of peaking at the right time,” Piastri said.
“It was looking like a tricky weekend so to come out with that, I’m pretty stoked.
“We are both trying to beat each other every weekend. There’s a few variables in there that you can mix up, so let’s see what happens tomorrow.”
The McLaren pair will have to keep an eye on their mirrors, with four-time world champion Verstappen hoping to delight the fervent Dutch support from third on the grid.
Verstappen – who does face a trip to the stewards for driving unnecessarily slowly – was 0.263 seconds off the pole pace but was satisfied to be the best of the rest behind the dominant McLaren duo.
“To be P3, I’m very happy with that. The energy of the crowd has been amazing and to see so much orange is always very special,” Verstappen said.
“McLaren have been very fast, so it’s important to focus on our own race but this has been a good step forward so I hope we can keep that up in the race tomorrow.”
Isack Hadjar was a career-best fourth for Racing Bulls, with George Russell fifth for Mercedes and the Ferrari of Lewis Hamilton seventh.
The seven-time world champion said on Thursday he was determined to enjoy his driving again, after describing himself as “absolutely useless” when he started and finished 12th in Hungary last time out.
Hamilton may struggle to find much joy in Ferrari’s pace this weekend, regularly over a second-and-a-half adrift during practice and his fastest lap over seven tenths off the pole pace.
