01 March 2024 , 18:00
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Max Verstappen admits his pole position in Bahrain was "a little bit unexpected" following their struggles in practice.
Red Bull have been the sport's dominant force across the past two years, but that looked to be under threat as the likes of Mercedes and Ferrari bettered them in the build up to qualifying. When it mattered though the defending world champion found the sufficient pace, sticking his car on pole.
Early on in the session it quickly became apparent that Verstappen was among the quickest drivers despite his frustrations in practice. He edged out Charles Leclerc but concedes that hooking his car up in the final round of qualifying wasn't as easy as it looked.
He told Sky Sports: "It was a lot of fun. The track had a lot of grip but with the wind the last two days, it was tricky to get the whole lap together. It was the same in qualifying. To really get everything out of it in Q3 was a little more difficult but I'm very happy to be on pole. It was a little bit unexpected but luckily in qualifying the car came to us and I felt a bit happier with the whole car."
Verstappen won in Bahrain last year for the first time and will be the overwhelming favourite to take the chequered flag on Saturday. The Dutchman is eyeing a fourth straight world championship and his rivals still feel as though the Red Bull man could be beyond them.
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George Russell, who lines up in third, said: "I think it will be a close fight between everybody apart from Max. Red Bull are so strong at the moment and Max is doing a great job.
"He's got the new tyres. If there's an opportunity to take the lead but ultimately the race for all of us is for second. But, nobody knows, it's the first race of the season, I'm so excited to be back and let's hope for some craziness."
The Red Bull starts on pole ahead of Charles Leclerc's FerrariLeclerc said: "I’m confident we did a step forward but we have to wait and see tomorrow how much of a step forward we did. We really think that Red Bull is still ahead by quite a bit, in the race I mean. So we’ll see, but if there’s an opportunity as always I’ll go for it, and we’ll see what happens tomorrow."
Verstappen had expressed frustration with the overall setup and calibration of the car during the practice sessions. The Dutchman has been making that known to his race engineer, claiming that everything felt messy while driving.
When he landed pole the world champion said on his radio: "We did very well in that qualifying to get the most out of it. So thank you to everyone. Well done."