Belgian GP Qualifying: Norris steals it from Piastri, Leclerc second best
F1 NewsSaturday, 26 July 2025 at 17:05
Lando Norris turned the tables on teammate Oscar Piastri and took pole for the 2025 Belgian Grand Prix, as Charles Leclerc emerged as best of the rest qualifying third fastest.
Norris has been playing catch up with Piastri since the start of the weekend in Spa as the latter seemed to have the advantage taking Sprint pole on Friday after topping practice.
But come qualifying, Norris finally caught up delivering a blistering middle sector in his final Q3 lap and went on to take pole from his teammate by less than a tenth of a second.
Leclerc, on a day when seven-time Formula 1 champion Lewis Hamilton was knocked out of qualifying from Q1, was third fastest in the Ferrari.
The came Max Verstappen, who after the highs of the Sprint Race which he won after 15 laps of masterful defending from Piastri, had to eat some humble pie and was only good for fourth after a messy final lap in Q3 where he did a mistake at Turn 1 which cost him.
The reigning F1 champion never looked good for pole, but he should've been able to take third or even spit the McLarens.
Red Bull opted for a setup change between the Sprint Race and Qualifying, probably with Verstappen nightmare from Silverstone still fresh in memory especially as weather forecast predicts rain for the race on Sunday which would require a higher downforce setup.
McLaren on the other hand did some minor fine tuning in the setup of their MCL39 before qualifying.
After a tough Sprint Qualifying on Friday, Alex Albon bounced back and was a superb fifth at the end of qualifying beating Mercedes' George Russell who was sixth.
Albon's teammate, Carlos Sainz was 15th while Russell's teammate Kimi Antonelli was out from Q1 and was down in 18th.
Yuki Tsunoda did well to take seventh in the second Red Bull, over seven tenths off the pace and was less than a tenth ahead of Isack Hadjar, eighth for the Racing Bulls.
Tsunoda was running without the upgrades up until Qualifying but Red Bull bolted the new parts on his car between the Sprint Race and Qualifying.
It was a good day for the Racing Bulls as Liam Lawson put the second VCARB in the top ten, ninth fastest, with Bortoleto a superb tenth.
What the top three said
Polesitter Norris, played down the gap Piastri had over him up until qualifying, and said: "It was a decent lap, so happy.
"Everyone was pretty worried after yesterday," he pointed out. "I wasn't even that far off, it was just a couple of little issues that we had.
"So I was confident after yesterday and confident coming into today so it was nice to see I could get back to the top," the Briton insisted. "Three tenths is just slipstream and not being first out of the pit lane, so it was nothing to worry about. But people like to make a lot of things up, but I felt good.
"The car has been flying all weekend, Oscar has been doing a good job all weekend, so we are pushing each other a lot."
And when asked about the weather forecast for the Grand Prix, Norris revealed: "I prefer it to stay dry, honestly.
"Even for the fans - I think it's rained here for the last 10 years or something, so it would be nice to have a dry Sunday.
"But I don't mind whether it's dry or rain or somewhere in the middle, it's normal here and I look forward to a fun race," he concluded.
Piastri did not hide his disappointment after losing out on pole to his teammate; he commented: “A bit disappointing.
"The second lap was coming together really well, and I just made a little mistake into (turn) 14 and lost a lot of time.
“Disappointed. I felt like the car was very good again, but it’s fine margins out there. It’s obviously not a bad place to be starting but there was more in it, which is always disappointing.
“I don’t know," was the Aussie's response when asked if Norris' improvement surprised him. "We’re a good team-mate pairing and we learn a lot from each other, every weekend. That’s what makes us such a good team, but it also makes it difficult when you’re trying to fight each other.
“I felt like I did an ok job today but just didn’t quite execute when it mattered. A bit of a shame," he concluded
As for Leclerc, he was satisfied with his performance, he said: "I'm very happy today, It's strange to say that because it's still 0.3s and it's only a third place, but I did not expect it.
"We thought we were quite a lot more back. We knew that we had something more in the car with the upgrade this weekend but we still struggled yesterday, but that was a really, really good lap.
"I'm very happy with the lap, how the car felt, so it's good that we put everything together for qualy," the Monegasque maintained.
Q1: Hamilton out once again!
The session started in dry conditions with some clouds as the track temperature was 37 degrees Celsius while the air temperature at 22 degrees.
The two Alpine cars were leading the queue in the pitlane waiting for the green light to go on and kick off the qualifying.
And just before matter started, Nico Hulkenberg had contact with Lance Stroll in the pitlane, the former damaging his front wing and having it replaced. Fernando Alonso also had a similar moment with Oliver Bearman but without contact.
No further action was taken on Alonso/Bearman incident while the Stroll/Hulkenberg one would be investigated after the session.
With 16 minutes remaining, both Red Bulls, Mercedes and Bortoleto remained in their respective garages.
Sainz started a timed lap but then pitted at the end of it before completing Norris and Piastri posted the first lap times of the session. The Australian topped with his teammate behind.
Russell went third with Antonelli fourth, but soon Verstappen, joined the action with an RB21 carrying more downforce and soon started his timed lap. He went second fastest.
But then more lap times were on the board and Lawson went to the top of timing screens with Albon second. Then Sainz bettered the Kiwi, only for Leclerc to go even better.
First runs produced the following order: Leclerc - Sainz - Lawson - Albon - Bearman - Hamilton - Piastri - Verstappen - Norris - Pierre Gasly - Hadjar - Hulkenberg - Tsunoda - Esteban Ocon - Alonso.
But with less than five minutes on the clock, the second round of laps began and as Q1 was over, it was Norris who was fastest with a 1:41.010, 0.191s ahead of Piastri in second as Verstappen was third fastest.
The rest of the top 15 were as follows: Hadjar - Bearman - Leclerc - Sainz - Lawson - Albon - Russell - Gasly - Tsunoda - Hulkenberg - Ocon - Bortoleto.
And for the second day in a row, Hamilton was eliminated in the first part of qualifying after losing his lap for track limits.
As such, the Briton was 16th fastest, with Franco Colapinto behind him in 17th as Antonelli was down in 18th after another dismal qualifying from the Italian rookie.
The Aston Martins of Alonso and Stroll were 19th and 20th respectively.
Q2: No heroics from Sainz and Gasly!
The second part of qualifying started with drivers rushing out on track while Hamilton remained in his Ferrari as it appeared the team were discussing the stewards' decision. He ultimately stepped out of his car.
Verstappen started his flying lap first and went to the top spot, the Ocon went second fastest but was dropped to third by Tsunoda.
Piastri then went to the top of the pile with Norris then going second fastest dropping Verstappen to third.
After the first round of laps, the order was: Piastri - Norris - Verstappen - Leclerc - Tsunoda - Russell - Albon - Hadjar - Ocon - Lawson.
In the drop zone were: Hulkenberg - Bortoleto - Gasly - Sainz - Bearman.
Bearman did not post a lap time as he had to abort his lap after an error that sent him wide as Pouhon.
With less than five minutes on the clock, the drivers set out on track for the final Q2 run. Verstappen remained in the garage opting not to run again.
In the end of Q2, Piastri led the way with a 1:40.626, 0.089s ahead of Norris in second while Verstappen was third.
The rest of the top ten were: Leclerc - Tsunoda - Russell - Hadjar - Lawson - Bortoleto - Albon.
The first driver to miss out on Q3 was Ocon who was 11th fastest losing to Albon by 0.020s and was followed by his teammate, Bearman, who was 12th.
Gasly, unlike Sprint Qualifying, did not make the top ten shootout and was 13th fastest for Alpine, with Hulkenberg behind him in 14th.
Sainz, after a decent job in Friday's Sprint shootout, was only 15th.
Q3: Verstappen pays price of error!
The drivers did not waste any time getting out on track as Q3 was given the green light as all ten remaining drivers left their garages.
Russell went first and went fastest, but then Verstappen went faster while Piastri went even faster only for Norris to beat them and take provisional pole.
Verstappen was over half a second slower than Norris and complained about grip, but he was on a used set of Soft tyres.
Leclerc was fourth ahead of Russell in fifth with Tsunoda in sixth and Lawson in seventh. Albon, Hadjar, and Bortoleto followed. The Brazilian's time was deleted for exceeding track limits at Turn 10.
With four minutes remaining, the drivers hit the track for the final time. Verstappen was the first to start his final Q3 lap as Norris followed with Piastri in their wake.
Verstappen improved his time but remained third while Norris could not improve as Leclerc did improve to third while Piastri could not challenge his teammate and lost out on pole by 0.085s.
Verstappen appeared to suffer from wheel spin at Turn 1 on his final lap and once again complained about lack of grip.
So the final order of qualifying was: Norris - Piastri - Leclerc - Verstappen - Albon - Russell - Tsunoda - Hadjar - Lawson - Bortoleto.
Belgian GP Qualifying - Provisional Classification
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