MADRID, 30 Jul. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The British driver George Russell (Mercedes) has achieved this Saturday the first pole of his team this season and the first of his career and will start first on the grid of this Sunday’s race of the Hungarian Grand Prix, the thirteenth round of the calendar, after a qualifying session in which the water gave a truce, with the Ferraris of Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc completing the podium and Fernando Alonso (Alpine) was sixth.
With a time of 1:17.377, the British was the fastest in Q3 thanks to a stratospheric lap in a Grand Prix in which Mercedes was not expected. Sainz will start second and join Russell on the front row, after being just 44 thousandths slower than the Mercedes driver. Leclerc completes the top three positions on the grid, with a time of 1:17.567.
It was not the best day for Red Bull, first with the unexpected elimination of Sergio Pérez in Q2 -he will start eleventh- and then with Verstappen unable to complete a competitive lap in Q3 due to reliability problems in his car in the second and definitive attempt, while in the first stake he went too far. Thus, the Dutchman could only be tenth in qualifying (1:18.823), almost a second and a half behind the ‘poleman’.