Lando Norris said he was prepared for an unstable and wet Belgian Grand Prix after he held off championship rival Oscar Piastri to take pole position.
Norris beat his McLaren teammate Piastri by just 0.085 seconds at Spa-Francorchamps, with Ferrari's Charles Leclerc finishing third.
In the other bright red car, Lewis Hamilton was eliminated in Q1 and will start from 16th place – a result the seven-time world champion described as “unacceptable”.
Norris took his fourth pole of the season and second in three races in dry conditions, but rain is forecast which could disrupt Sunday's 44-lap race in the Ardennes.
However, Norris has won both of the wet races this year – the final round in Melbourne and the final round at Silverstone three weeks ago – and said: “It's likely to rain and at Spa there's a good chance it'll only hit half the track and not the other half, so we could have a chaotic race like Australia or Silverstone.”
“Hopefully I can take advantage of my advantage at the front, but I don't expect it to be dry. I expect rain and more chaos.”
Norris qualified six-tenths of a second behind Piastri for Saturday's sprint. He started third and finished in the same position as Piastri, one place ahead of him, allowing the Australian to extend his championship lead from eight to nine points.
Max Verstappen won the first Formula 1 race since Christian Horner was sacked as Red Bull team principal and the reigning champion will start from fourth place in Sunday's main event.
However, in qualifying on Saturday, Norris put in a strong performance on the opening lap of Q3, holding a lead of almost two-tenths over Piastri heading into the final runs, and although he was unable to improve on that result, while Piastri did, it was enough to secure the 13th pole position of his career and put him in contention for a hat-trick of consecutive wins.
“Everyone was very worried after yesterday, but I wasn't that far from the truth,” Norris said.
“There was nothing to worry about, but people like to make up all sorts of nonsense.
Sourse: breakingnews.ie
