00:01And there is the car park right at the end of the lap that Verstappen is now
00:05joining and he's gonna have to find his way through the car park.
00:09I've got some misfiring, misfiring. Copy, copy.
00:12They changed the power unit on Valtteri Bottas' Mercedes and that might be giving
00:17him a few problems. Misfiring, misfiring, he's gonna come into the pits. George
00:21Russell takes the chequered flag back to Bottas in a moment. 13th is the best that
00:25he can do. He's still very much at risk. Valtteri Bottas' engine has caused him to
00:32stop, so that is not him being called to the random way bridge, which is just a
00:36little bit further on. At least they can push him back to the garage.
00:40Mick Schumacher is sending personal best. Sebastian Vettel is sending a personal best
00:43in the middle sector. It's not been a great lap for Lance Stroll as Giovinazzi crosses
00:48the line. He's 13th fastest. Fernando Alonso at risk from this man. Sebastian Vettel
00:53who's making a dash now towards the line. Can he knock? Fernando Alonso out of
00:57qualifying? No, he can't. Only 17th fastest and his teammate Lance Stroll not
01:03really picking up the pace either. As Mick Schumacher out qualifies Nikita Mazepin
01:07is still the only driver not to reach Q2 so far this season. Stroll pits. Both Aston
01:12Martins out in Q1. That is a disastrous session for the team from Silverstone.
01:19Carlos Sainz, who we already know has struggled and exceeded track limits, has now gone for
01:25something of a spin. He won't want to start the race on those tyres.
01:29Wow. That was lucky. Yeah. I mean, look, the curb there.
01:35Saved it, Ricky. Saved it. Oh, he did touch the rear wing. Touched the rear wing end fences
01:39on the safer TechPro barrier there. So let's see then what Carlos Sainz could do with that
01:46patched up rear wing. Yeah, it won't be helping the aerodynamics a whole lot, but oh, we've got
01:51another one. That could have been very, very naughty indeed for Carlos Sainz and he's done
01:57very well to avoid the barriers. Just as you said, it's not going to help the aerodynamics.
02:01Off the track he goes. Fernando Alonso then, two green sectors so far. Still can't get in
02:07to the Q3 top ten shootout. Thirteenth at the moment. Did they just touch there?
02:14Yep, they did. Just had a contact with Alfa on the front right.
02:19Kimi Raikkonen going well and Giovinazzi in the top ten for Alfa Romeo as they both home
02:25in on the end of this phase of their Formula One careers and probably for Kimi, of course,
02:29the end of the day. As Lewis walks the car towards the wall and then will sweep left
02:37and quickly then get on the power and these just keep coming at you. And you don't need all of
02:42the
02:42track through that corner and then just ride the kerb through the exit. Oh, and that's nearly gone round on
02:47him.
02:48And Lewis Hamilton grateful that there was enough runoff area for him to thread his car in between
02:54the kerbs and the concrete and come back out onto the track again. He got pole at the last race
03:00in Qatar.
03:01Lewis Hamilton would dearly love pole here this evening. Track position could be king
03:06for this race tomorrow night. He's now got the long home straight to go to see where this lap time
03:12will end up. And he goes quickest by a tenth of a second as Max Verstappen on his first flying
03:19lap
03:20goes quicker than Hamilton through the first sector. And Hamilton's Mercedes didn't really turn into the
03:25final corner too well. Can Max get it right into the apex here? And then a drive for the line
03:31for Max Verstappen
03:32and an important lap for him. As Bottas on another flying lap, a tenth of Verstappen in sector one.
03:37Verstappen crosses the line. He has put some daylight here in the evening between himself and Lewis Hamilton
03:44with just over five minutes remaining. Where does this lap put Bottas? Second fastest on the front row
03:50and ahead of his teammates. And as he finishes the first sector, he's only five one-hundredths of a second
03:56outside Max Verstappen's time. You just wonder, have Mercedes pulled something of a little bit of trickery over
04:03Red Bull here, fueling for the whole session, lulling maybe Red Bull into a false sense of security.
04:08So as the fuel burns off, Hamilton's pace increases. Is that why Verstappen is saying that he needs a tow
04:13to Red Bull know what Mercedes have done? And are they now thinking of ways that they can answer back,
04:19despite the fact that they're on provisional pole? This is boiling up into a very, very good finish
04:25to qualifying and it's not been a bad start to it either. No, that was much better through 22 and
04:3123
04:31for Lewis. So the car is looking better on the second attempt on these tyres. This is, if it can
04:37spot, the final apex. The front's still a little bit reluctant to go in and a short drive to the
04:43line
04:43now for Hamilton. He has not had consecutive pole positions in 2021. Hamilton crosses the line,
04:50he is a tenth and a half up and he is on provisional pole here in Jeddah this evening. This
04:56is it for
04:57Verstappen. Oh, did he touch the wall? He got perilously close to it there, Max Verstappen. Yeah,
05:02he had, he got wide in turn two, that's why. And he got on the throttle early, the back end
05:07of the car
05:07still sliding around a little bit on him through there. He has been mighty through this section of
05:12the racetrack and at the moment it's sticking for him and down towards the turn 13 and the banked corner.
05:19I don't think he hit the wall but he certainly used all of the road trying to get even more
05:23time
05:23out of the corners where he says he's pushing 100% already. 31.9 for the first sector, that's the
05:29fastest
05:30first sector time we've had so far. But this is where he needs the toe on the long straights on
05:35the back side of the track. Whoa, he's leaving no margin out there at all up against the walls.
05:41Verstappen knows this is it. This is the lap of the weekend. It's Hamilton, Verstappen, Verstappen,
05:47Hamilton. Who's going to take pole position here? Verstappen absolutely flying. The championship
05:52leader, he is eight points up on Lewis Hamilton going into this race weekend. Hamilton and Bottas at the
05:58moment are first and second on the front row as Bottas goes second fastest. But Verstappen can
06:04spoil the Mercedes party and ruin that one-two as he hits the wall right at the final corner. Max
06:11Verstappen hits the wall and pole position slides out of his grasp right at the end. The track with the
06:19most corners on the Formula One calendar this season has proved to be one with one too many corners for
06:26Max
06:26Verstappen. And will that have damaged his new gearbox for this weekend? If it has, he'll need a five
06:31place grid drop for a new gearbox. He had the pole position under control, got a little bit greedy on
06:38the exit of the very final turn 27 and third place will be his best starting position. Hamilton has come
06:48out to take pole position and crucially, even if Max doesn't get a grid penalty, it is a one-two.
06:55It's a
06:56front row lockout for Mercedes-Benz.
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