Verstappen steals Baku pole in six-red-flag mayhem as Sainz shocks for Williams
Baku did what Baku does best: stop-start chaos, walls inching closer, and a qualifying session that refused to end. Out of that mess stepped Max Verstappen, who kept his head, saved his lap, and nicked pole position in a session that broke the record for red flags — six of them, if you’re counting — and ended in a one-lap shootout.
The four-time World Champion didn’t just beat the clock; he beat the tire gods. With the afternoon chopped to pieces by accidents and rain specks teasing the grid, Verstappen admitted he’d run his allocation dry. “So many red flags,” he said. “It was very difficult to get your lap together. In Q3, with a bit of rain around, you just have to send it. I wasn’t even on the best tyres that I wanted, but because of all the red flags, you basically run out.”
He sent it. It stuck.
For a minute, it looked like Carlos Sainz might produce the headline of the year. The Williams driver — yes, Williams driver — had hustled himself into the fight and stood a lap away from an improbable pole before Verstappen snatched it back right at the end. Sainz still banked a front-row start, which is a storyline all on its own around here.
The rest? Brutal. Oscar Piastri and Charles Leclerc both found the walls as the session repeatedly reset itself, while Lando Norris kissed concrete hard enough to need repairs and a deep breath. It was that sort of day: tire temperatures yo-yoing, brake magic switched off and on, and engineers staring at weather radars like crystal balls.
When it finally mattered, Q3 was a single roll of the dice. No rhythm, no build-up, just one lap with ruffled tyre blankets and twitchy rear ends. Verstappen threaded the needle, and Red Bull — rejuvenated since his Monza pole-win double — looked like a team that’s rediscovered certainty. “It seems like since Monza we’re doing a better job,” he added. “I hope we can continue in that way.”
In truth, qualifying became a survival exercise. Every stoppage flipped the strategy board: scrubbed sets, heat-cycled softs, and nervous talk of whether used rubber might be kinder than a cold, brand-new set dumped into damp patches. Verstappen’s camp called it right. He didn’t need the perfect set; he needed the perfect lap. He got it.
For Sunday, that front row is dynamite. Sainz has straight-line speed and a slippery Williams under him, the kind of package that makes the 2.2-kilometre drag to Turn 1 feel awfully long if you’re starting on the inside. Verstappen knows the game here: manage the launch, own the slipstream fight, keep your mirrors full but your nose clean. Safety Cars are Baku’s native species; track position is gold only until it isn’t.
Behind them, the bruises will show. McLaren’s title push took a dent with Piastri’s crash, and Leclerc’s afternoon turned sour at exactly the wrong time for Ferrari. Norris may still turn damage limitation into a podium bid — it’s Baku, after all — but qualifying sent a clear message: this one’s going to be won by whoever makes the fewest mistakes.
Verstappen, for his part, sounded content rather than giddy. “From FP1 we were not too bad,” he said, “and we just kept on improving a tiny amount, and then we were there in qualifying. That’s, of course, where it matters.” That’s him in a sentence: a small edge, relentlessly polished, even when the session around him is falling apart.
It’s easy to call this pole routine. It wasn’t. This was opportunistic, patient, and a little ruthless — an old-school Baku lap built on feel more than telemetry. If Monza hinted Red Bull had found some grip on its season, Baku confirmed it. Now comes the hard part: 51 laps with a field that smells opportunity, a Williams on the front row, and a street circuit that’s never been shy about chaos.
Bring spares. Bring nerve. Baku hasn’t had its final say.
