After a “tough start”, Verstappen didn’t expect to qualify in the top three

Max Verstappen admitted to some surprise in finishing third in Formula 1 qualifying for the Australian Grand Prix, following Red Bull’s turnaround in fortunes after a lacklustre pair of Friday practice sessions.

The reigning champion ended up fifth in FP1 and seventh in FP2 after struggling with a wayward RB21 chassis during his qualifying simulations, while his new team-mate Liam Lawson found the car even harder to drive and sat in the bottom quarter of the timesheets.

Overnight work seemed to bring the Red Bull into a much better frame; Verstappen was just 0.081s away from Oscar Piastri’s FP3 benchmark to sit third fastest, and reclaimed that position in qualifying – albeit 0.385s shy of Lando Norris’ pole lap.

Reflecting on qualifying, Verstappen explained that the car was still lacking a little bit of outright pace, but that the balance changes had made it much easier to get the tyres into the right window for a qualifying lap.

“We had a bit of a tough start. This has never really been a good track to us I think as well, so it took a bit of time to understand how we can improve the situation, and we did that today,” Verstappen suggested.

“I’m quite surprised to be sitting here [in the press conference] after yesterday! I felt confident. I felt one with the car. Of course, clearly it was lacking a bit of pace, but overall, happy with the laps in qualifying.

“We were just trying to fine-tune the balance, and the car just came alive a little bit more in general, it was quite OK to drive because it was too slow.

“Today it was a little bit faster, but clearly still not fast enough. But still, to be ahead of Ferrari and Mercedes I think is good for us.”

Verstappen also noted that the sensitivity of the tyres, particularly in the higher-speed corners, made it difficult to maintain the pace through the lap – a phenomenon shown in the drop-off in the final sector, as Verstappen often showed up well in sectors one and two.

He stated that he didn’t expect “miracles” from Red Bull’s long-run pace, which was found to be the fourth-best in the field when accounting for the medium-tyre stints – although this was before the team made changes to the RB21’s set-up.

“I don’t expect like any kind of miracles about it, I think [long-run pace] is OK. But I think it’s not on the same level [as the McLarens]. I’ll just do my best to see what happens tomorrow.”