Verstappen: That lap felt really terrible

Indeed it was a crazy SQ3 in the neighbourhood of the Miami Dolphins. By the time the dust had settled, Verstappen was P1 of the timing screens, 0.108s faster than Ferrari's Charles Leclerc and the 'traditional' quarter-of-a-second or so up on Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez in P3.

Not a McLaren in sight when the smart money, after SQ2, would be on Lando Norris and/or Oscar Piastri fighting for a front-row slot. But like many they could hardly improve on their times in SQ3, while Verstappen found an extra four-tenths of a second. That made the difference.

In Parc Ferme afterwards, asked about his Miami Sprint Race pole-winning lap, Verstappen replied: "It felt really terrible. Maybe that last session was just incredibly difficult to get the tyres to work. Already in SQ2 I didn't feel great. SQ3, it just felt quite similar for me.

"I didn't really improve on the soft. Somehow we were first. Of course, I happily take it. But it didn't feel enjoyable out there to drive for whatever reason because in practice it felt really, really nice, I was very comfortable and confident, qualifying, not so much."

"It might be the track layout a little bit. I thought after practice, I was quite confident we could fight for pole, then in qualifying it didn't really look like that for me. But somehow we ended up in first. I don't know what happened to the other cars on that last lap."

In the Red Bull report from Miami on Friday, the triple F1 World Champion and current Championship leader, Verstappen observed: "On a track surface like this, it means that if you are a little bit out with the tyres it makes a big difference, but I think everyone else particularly struggled with the final run on the soft tyres.

"We have a few things to analyse and question why it felt a bit different from qualifying, but we should get it together fine for tomorrow. All in all, we have a great starting position for the Sprint and hopefully we can maximise this. Once the tyres stablilise, we should be back on track," concluded Verstappen.

Summing up his SQ session in the team report, Perez said: “It was a tricky session, we had one shot on that soft compound but we just didn’t maximise it and we got caught out a little bit with the grip, it changed here and there.

"Given that we only had a single go on that soft tyre it is down to a bit of luck about what the car is going to do. It is very challenging to go from just one practice into that session but it’s the same for everyone.

"I think the McLarens were the fastest cars out there, but they just couldn’t work it out on the soft compound. We have some work to do there and hopefully, by [Saturday] we can work it out.

"The aim will be to get as many points as possible in the Sprint and then we will go from there into the race. I think we are heading in the right direction and hopefully, we can see a stronger race pace," added Perez, who last year finished P2 behind Max at the second Miami GP.

Red Bull F1 boss Christian Horner was chuffed ion Friday evening: “It was a very good qualifying for us in the end and it looked for a while in Q2, on the medium tyre, that we weren't potentially the strongest car.

"The wind was definitely a factor today but I think both drivers did a very good job and to line up first and third was more than we were expecting.

"You could hear the surprise in Max's voice on the slowdown lap because he didn't feel the lap had actually been good enough to capture the pole, it was just evident that everybody was struggling with the conditions. It all came good in the end and great to be starting on the front, first and third for the race, but still a lot to do," added Horner.