F1 Abu Dhabi GP: Norris on pole in McLaren 1-2, Hamilton out in Q1

Lando Norris took pole place for Formulation 1’s 2024 season finale in Abu Dhabi forward of Oscar Piastri and Carlos Sainz, as long-time qualifying chief Max Verstappen ended up solely fifth.

Elsewhere, Charles Leclerc misplaced his finest lap in Q2 to a monitor limits violation for Ferrari, which boosts McLaren’s possibilities of netting the constructors’ title even additional given its 1-2, whereas Lewis Hamilton’s ultimate weekend for Mercedes included a shock Q1 exit.

Verstappen had appeared in management by the opening segments, with the Dutchman the one driver to get by to Q3 with two units of latest softs.

He used his first to guide with a 1m22.945s, albeit with a lurid slide out of the ultimate nook as Norris trailed by 0.004s at this stage.

On the ultimate runs, Verstappen ran final of the pack however didn’t enhance, because the added grip punch of the brand new softs bought McLaren again to the pacesetting place it had established in FP1 and FP2.

Piastri shot to a 1m22.804s, which shuffled outgoing Haas star Nico Hulkenberg again from the provisional pole he had snared with the opening effort on the ultimate runs – the German finally ending up fourth.

Norris then got here by to edge his team-mate by 0.21s whereas setting a purple ultimate sector, with Piastri’s Q3 beginning with him briefly dropping his first run time as he flirted with monitor limits exiting Flip 1.

Behind on the ultimate fliers, Verstappen solely set a private finest within the ultimate sector and so didn’t go faster general – the four-time world champion ending forward of Pierre Gasly’s Alpine and George Russell for Mercedes.

Then got here Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso, whereas Sergio Perez did not beat Valtteri Bottas’s Sauber to ninth, with the Mexican rounding out the highest 10 in what could possibly be his ultimate F1 race.

In Q2, Leclerc appeared to have progressed because the quickest runner, with earlier section chief Verstappen even briefly out of his automobile within the pits, however the Ferrari driver slipped fractionally past monitor limits at Flip 1 and so misplaced his 1m22.985s private finest.

Not like Crimson Bull with Perez in Q1, Ferrari couldn’t get Leclerc’s time reinstated as a patch of blue kerb paint was seen as he went deep by the left-hander and his fall to 14th means he will start last with his battery-change grid penalty.

The opposite Q2 fallers have been RB duo Yuki Tsunoda and Liam Lawson in eleventh and twelfth, with Lance Stroll thirteenth and Kevin Magnussen fifteenth.

Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF-24

Picture by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Photographs

In Q1, Hamilton was the large shock faller – the Mercedes driver down in direction of the drop zone after the preliminary runs, and with a giant monitor enchancment issue evidenced by former team-mate Bottas leaping from sixteenth to second within the section finally topped by Leclerc.

On the finish of Hamilton’s ultimate flier, the place he was trailing Magnussen throughout, the Haas car cut Turn 14 and knocked a green bollard into the seven-time world champion’s path meaning he did the final corners with his car handling compromised.

He did not set a private finest on the line – exiting Q1 alongside Alex Albon, Zhou Guanyu, Franco Colapinto and collection debutant Jack Doohan.