Verstappen’s serious pace a sharp contrast to ‘silly’ Mercedes

Champion storms to another pole while Hamilton and Russell clash

There will probably be no short debrief at Mercedes in Barcelona as the team once operationally as slick as they come were left looking hamfisted in qualifying for the Spanish Grand Prix. Even the team principal, Toto Wolff, held his hands up to what he described as a “silly” incident.

Max Verstappen delivered a devastatingly strong lap for pole but in his wake Lewis Hamilton and his fellow Mercedes driver, George Russell, hit one another on track, the first time the pair have clashed since becoming teammates in 2022.

The incident was unintentional, Wolff said, and a failing on behalf of the team. “It’s all down to miscommunication because drivers in the same team don’t want to crash into each other on their final lap in qualifying,” he said. “It was just an unfortunate situation. It looks silly.”

Russell, who had aborted a flying lap and was looking to start another, did not know Hamilton was behind him and approaching at pace to begin his own hot lap when he moved over on the straight. Hamilton was forced on to the grass to avoid Russell but clipped him, taking damage to his front wing in the process.

Hamilton accused his teammate of backing off, saying: “That is really dangerous.”

Russell laid the blame with the team, saying he had not been informed Hamilton was behind him and insisted there would be an investigation. “Just a massive miscommunication,” he said.

“We need to talk internally how that happened because [with] two teammates that should never happen, it wasn’t either one’s fault, Lewis probably just didn’t know I was starting a lap too.”

Hamilton also referred to it as a miscommunication and said he had spoken to his teammate about it. “I went and shook his hand and that was it.”

With the team already struggling with a car that is off the pace (albeit certainly improved in Barcelona, with Hamilton fifth), they need to deliver operationally on every level to maximise their chances. Instead, this appeared to be a case of them taking their eye off the ball.

Both drivers were summoned to the stewards with Russell facing a charge of “abnormally changing direction” causing an impact, having qualified in 12th struggling with the wrong setup.

At the sharp end of the grid, Verstappen was, in contrast, delivering another crushing masterclass.

At a track that suits the Red Bull’s strengths, the Dutchman was dominant. At the business end of Q3 he was flying, setting the pace with a 1min 12.272sec lap on his first quick run, almost a second clear.

For the second flying laps the world champion had done enough: no one could come close and Verstappen was up again in the opening two sectors before he backed off with the pole secure. He finished half a second clear and would have been even further ahead had he completed that final run. “The car was on rails,” he said and it truly was.

Verstappen leads the championship by 39 points from his teammate, Sergio Pérez, who had another shocking qualifying after spinning off and finishing 11th. The world champion has four wins from six races this season, with Red Bull still unbeaten.

Indeed, in Barcelona, Verstappen conceded for the first time that the team’s advantage in pace was such that is was conceivable they could manage an unprecedented feat of taking a clean sweep of wins across all 22 meetings. On this form it looked achievable.

Wolff was blunt in his assessment of the advantage Red Bull hold. “Verstappen is just on a different level and it pisses me off to say that but it is the reality,” he said. “It is a meritocracy and they have done a very good job and they are just far away.”