Verstappen Starts 2024 Season with Pole Position in Bahrain

Max Verstappen, current Formula 1 champion, started the 2024 season strongly, securing pole position at the Bahrain Grand Prix. Beating Charles Leclerc by a margin of 0.228 seconds, Verstappen positioned himself at the top with a time of 1m29.179s in Q3, after a more reserved performance in the earlier stages of qualifying.

While Leclerc led Q2 with an impressive time, he failed to replicate his performance in Q3, ending with a time of 1m29.407s. This placed Verstappen in pole position, particularly excelling in the first sector of the track.

George Russell, from the Mercedes team, experienced tense moments in Q2, narrowly escaping elimination, but recovered in Q3 to achieve the third-best time of 1m29.485s. Despite an investigation for exceeding the maximum delta time in Q1, Russell maintained his position in the second row for Saturday's race.

Carlos Sainz, showing speed in Q1, could not maintain the edge over his teammate Leclerc, but still placed ahead of Red Bull's Sergio Pérez, who moved up to fifth place by the end of Q3.

Fernando Alonso, opting to run in a gap, completed a single lap in Q3 that initially put him third, but he eventually ended up sixth. Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, both of McLaren, took the fourth row, while Lewis Hamilton, not showing the expected pace, finished behind his teammate Russell. Nico Hulkenberg rounded out the top 10, unable to improve his time from Q2.

Yuki Tsunoda and Lance Stroll fell out of the top 10 due to the late efforts of Russell and Hamilton in Q2, while Daniel Ricciardo, Kevin Magnussen, Valtteri Bottas, Zhou Guanyu, and Logan Sargeant were eliminated in earlier stages. Alpine, with Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly, struggled, staying at the bottom of the time table throughout the session.