Stay informed on all the biggest stories in Formula 1. Sign up here to receive the Prime Tire newsletter in your inbox every Monday and Friday.
ZANDVOORT, Netherlands — Walking into Circuit Zandvoort on Saturday morning, the songs about Max Verstappen had already begun.
The Orange Army was out in full force for the Dutchman’s home grand prix weekend, but a different shade of orange topped qualifying. Lando Norris put together a mega final lap, taking pole position with a .365-second margin over Verstappen. The two will make up the front row and look to battle for the lead once again. Oscar Piastri is right behind them, alongside George Russell.
The Dutch Grand Prix weekend has had a strange feel thanks to tumultuous weather and crashes. Strong wind and rain threatened FP1 at times, while FP2 was overcast with persistent wind. Teams endured a lengthy red-flag period during FP3 after Logan Sargeant’s heavy crash. The damage from the wreck was so extensive that the American driver couldn’t participate in qualifying. Two surprise Q2 knockouts happened Saturday, with Carlos Sainz and Lewis Hamilton lining up outside the top 10.
Wind became a hot topic on Saturday due to cars’ sensitivity to it. Given the severe weather conditions leading to F1 Academy’s Race 1 postponement, it’s hard to imagine the seaside conditions won’t still be on the Formula One team’s minds as they prepare for Sunday.
Here are the storylines we’re keeping an eye on ahead of F1’s beachside grand prix.
GO DEEPER
Zandvoort circuit breakdown: Tight turns and steep banks define F1’s Dutch GP
Norris’s mighty lap sets up another Verstappen battle
Norris taking pole by over three-tenths of a second served as a big statement to Verstappen and Red Bull – especially on a short track like Zandvoort, where fine margins are the norm.
Boosted by the first major McLaren upgrade since Miami, Norris went into qualifying well in the hunt for pole and delivered an outstanding lap when it mattered at the end of Q3. He called it “by far my best lap” of the day.
“I felt good all the way through qualifying, honestly,” Norris said. “The car’s been strong all weekend, we’ve felt comfortable, we’ve felt strong.” The upgrade on the McLaren car has worked well, building on the medium-speed corner strength it flashed again at Zandvoort.
“Our long-run pace was pretty strong the other day,” Norris said. “But Max, Oscar, both the Mercs, especially George in the position he is, are quick and are going to be challenging. So I’m not expecting it to be easy, for sure.”
It sets up another chance for Norris to take the fight to Verstappen and potentially spoil the Dutchman’s homecoming. There hasn’t been a true battle between Norris and Verstappen since their battle for the win in Austria ended in contact, so the run to the first corner may get a bit of extra edge on Sunday.
Nailing the start will be crucial for Norris, particularly with overtaking being so difficult at Zandvoort. He’s failed to maintain the lead on the opening lap from any of his previous five P1 starts in F1 — a damning statistic, but one he brushed off after qualifying. “I feel confident I’ve put in a lot of work to make my starts a bit better,” he said. “Tomorrow’s a new day.”
The race is a big chance for Norris to take a step toward Verstappen in the title fight, as well as for McLaren. With Piastri starting third, it can take another bite out of Red Bull’s constructors’ lead. Even after the tension in Hungary, Norris and Piastri remain free to race each other at the front. “We’re free to try and both win the race,” Piastri said. “That’s not changed.”
GO DEEPER
Why McLaren’s F1 title hopes hinge on everyone, not just Lando Norris, learning to be perfect
Red Bull’s lack of pace
When watching Verstappen navigate qualifying, it seemed the Red Bull driver sometimes found it challenging to put together a lap. He said he “had a bit of a moment in (Turns) 11 and 12” on his final Q3 lap. The gusts of wind during qualifying, a topic several drivers mentioned, did not help matters.
“Every run, there were always one or two corners where I felt like I was losing a lot of time with just the gust of wind. And it seemed like it was very sensitive for us. The car was really responding aggressively to it. And that’s why I think every single run that I did it was different. I just had a different balance every time.”
Verstappen felt the car seemed on edge when he tried to push in Q3. He’s happy with a front-row start, but it is a mighty pace gap to Norris. “I think the whole qualifying, we just lacked a bit of pace,” he said during his on-track interview. “I tried the best I could.”
Red Bull is on the back foot this weekend. (Sipa USA)
Over the last two days, the Dutchman said he didn’t feel close to the McLarens. He was asked about his comments regarding Red Bull’s lack of top pace and whether this is the reality for the team until new upgrades come. He answered, in part, “If you look at the last, what, seven races, it’s just been a bit more difficult for us. And we are trying to understand or try to just improve the situation. But it’s not a magic button or switch that you turn.”
Despite how Verstappen has felt this weekend, it is a 72-lap race, and he does have a front-row start again. Norris’s starts have sometimes been a weaker point, while Verstappen rarely missteps. If Verstappen beats Norris and the other drivers in the rush to Turn 1, he likely won’t have the previous norm of mega leads but could have a shot at winning his home race once again.
Bleak outlook for Sainz and Hamilton after Q2 exits
With the dirty air problem only increasing this year and the closer performance margins between the teams, Sunday’s race could be particularly difficult for passing.
It’s not good news for Sainz or Hamilton, who dropped out in Q2. While 11th-placed Sainz was never expected to fight toward the front, given how much Ferrari has struggled of late, Hamilton — the in-form driver heading into the summer break — was a surprise exit, languishing down in P12 for Mercedes. After the session, stewards determined Hamilton had impeded Sergio Pérez during Q1, resulting in a three-place grid drop penalty. Hamilton will start in P15.
Hamilton admitted after the session that the car felt like it was on a “knife-edge” through qualifying, a recurring issue he’s encountered this year. “We changed the car quite a lot, and it was a nightmare today,” Hamilton said.
It’s a setback for Hamilton after his pre-summer break upswing in performance, winning twice in five races and always finishing inside the top four through that period. The seven-time world champion wasn’t too optimistic about his race day chances, saying it would be “a struggle to get into the top 10” as things stand.
There was a similar feeling of pessimism from the Ferrari drivers. Sainz thought traffic in Q2 might have stopped him from advancing but admitted that “maybe I was being optimistic by believing we could make it” through. Teammate Charles Leclerc got up to sixth, albeit nine-tenths off Norris on pole.
The bouncing issue that returned with the Spain upgrade has been resolved, but the performance simply hasn’t been found. “Unfortunately, I am repeating myself too much in the last few months,” Leclerc said when summing up Ferrari’s issues. “But that is the reality we are in at the moment.”
With Red Bull and McLaren surging ahead and Russell hanging on to their coattails, Sunday could leave Hamilton and the Ferraris a step behind.
Williams’ Saturday went from bad to worse
Williams has been waiting for this upgrade package. But Alex Albon says, “In terms of a feeling, the car hasn’t changed.”
It’s been a tricky start to the season, Albon only scoring four points so far out of 14 race weekends. The grid has been tighter this year, and Williams has lacked competitiveness and is delayed in producing spare parts. Albon called this upgrade package “a general weight reduction and downforce increase.” The balance hasn’t changed, and the limitations through the corners remain.
“So when I’m driving around, I don’t actually feel like I’m any different. But at the time, it’s about three or four positions higher,” Albon continued. “That will come, though. In the next few races, we’ve got another upgrade aiming to fix more the balance of the car, which I’m very interested and excited to come.”
It’s not a surprise that Albon advanced to Q3. Even he admitted the same. Williams was stronger at Zandvoort last year, Albon qualifying fourth and finishing eighth. Only his Saturday took a turn a couple of hours after qualifying finished, and he did his media interviews.
His car was checked after qualifying, and according to technical delegate Jo Bauer’s report, “the floor body was found to lie outside the regulatory volume.” The matter was referred to the stewards, and Albon was subsequently disqualified. He’ll start from the rear of the field. According to the stewards’ document, “The team did not dispute the calibration of the FIA measuring system and the measurement of the car, but stated that their own measurements have produced different results.”
Logan Sargeant crashed, and his car caught fire. And then things got worse for his team. (Rudy Carezzevoli/Getty Images)
Meanwhile, on the other side of the garage, Sargeant failed to compete in qualifying after his major FP3 wreck, which left his car on fire and with heavy damage. He walked away from the crash and later said, “I feel okay, little bit sore, but I’m alright.”
As far as what caused the wreck, Sargeant “just touched the curb. I didn’t want to pull the car off that too quickly, to avoid what ended up happening, but the second I touched the grass that was it, so needed to pull it off before the grass.”
The American driver owned his mistake, one he described as “a small mistake with a big consequence.” The team tried to repair the car in time for qualifying, but Sargeant said, “I could have looked at the car at the end of P3 and told you that wasn’t going to be ready.”
After failing to set a lap time in qualifying, Williams had to request that Sargeant be allowed to compete on Sunday, per the regulations. It wasn’t a concern as far as the rules go, but the question is whether his car will be ready.
Zandvoort’s wild weather creates a race of unknowns – and opportunities
F1’s return from summer break has not been straightforward, as high winds and intermittent showers on Friday were followed by heavier rain on Saturday. Sargeant’s FP3 crash wrote off two-thirds of the final practice, and the changing wind made it hard to know what setup direction to take come qualifying.
Norris explained how a 180-degree corner like Turn 1 was the perfect example of a corner where the wind direction matters greatly. “You have a big tailwind in and a big headwind out,” Norris said. “So the car feels shocking on the way in and pretty lovely on the way out. You kind of get both worlds.”
Changes in wind direction are tricky for drivers to manage, particularly as they significantly alter the aerodynamic load on the cars and impact their braking point going into a corner.
“It felt extremely like a lottery every lap, with different balance and different behavior of the car,” said Fernando Alonso, who qualified an impressive seventh for Aston Martin on what he called a “lucky lap” with the wind working in his favor through Turns 9 and 10. It meant he was reluctant to say the team had turned too much of a corner after its recent rough run of form despite both cars making it through to Q3.
“It’s been very windy, very gusty,” Williams’ Albon told F1 TV. “I think in some weird ways if you were 10 seconds behind another car, they could have a completely different wind to you. It’s not tenths, it’s halves of seconds that were in winds.”
Sunday’s forecast is far more serene than the rest of the weekend. It is forecast to be a dry day, and the wind is expected to drop slightly, but it should still impact the drivers out on the track.
Throw in some question marks over the long run pace and setups after the truncated practice running this weekend, and it sets up a possible race of unknowns.
GO DEEPER
Motorsports roundtable: Is Verstappen or Larson the world’s best all-around racer?
Top photo: Sipa USA
