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Ferrari travels to the Belgian Grand Prix hoping to improve but barely escapes a qualifying debacle. Clearly not enough for the top 10, Mercedes dominates once again. However, behind him, Renault achieves a surprise.
After Sebastian Vettel’s 20th and final place in the third free practice, Ferrari had to fear the worst. And it barely avoided humiliation in qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix. The former successful Formula 1 team is so far behind the leaders at Spa that it is no longer about wins and poles, but about not being pushed to the back of the field. Four-time German world champion Vettel and Charles Leclerc only survived the first part of qualifying with a bit of luck, but the Scuderia drivers had no chance in the fight for the top 10. Leclerc starts from 13th in tomorrow’s race Sunday (3.10 pm / RTL and on the live ticker on ntv.de), Vettel even only from 14.
“That of course is not a success, but all we were able to do today,” said Vettel: “That is the real picture. That is what the car can do here today,” Vettel said after the worst qualifying result. this year. “We know that we are not particularly strong at the moment, and when the track is not up to us, something like that comes out.” Leclerc didn’t have much more advice either: “I have no explanation why we are so far behind,” Monegasse said: “We have taken a big step back.”
Unsurprisingly, Mercedes dominated the front, Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas were driving in their own league. In the final qualifying section, World Championship leader Hamilton prevailed and secured pole position for the 93rd time in a new track record time of 1: 41.252 minutes, Bottas (+0.511 seconds) started the race from the second place. “This is for Chadwick,” Hamilton dedicated his performance on pit radio to actor Chadwick Boseman, who died at 43.
Behind, on the traditional route of the Ardennes, there was an exciting battle for the second row of the grid, which Max Verstappen, second overall, won at Red Bull (+0.526). Daniel Ricciardo was fourth in the Renault (+0.809), while Alexander Albon was fifth in the second Red Bull (+1.012).
Hamilton outscored the competition with his pole time, winning qualifying for the fifth time in the seventh round of the 2020 season. Even his teammate Bottas missed more than half a second, Leclerc’s Ferrari (1: 42,996 minutes) and Vettel (1: 43,261) lagged far behind and were very concerned about making it to Q2 and thus the top 15. For the first time in over six years, the Scuderia missed Q3 with both cars.
Of the Formel-1-Journalist Phillip Horton He tweeted after the end of qualifying that Ferrari was the only team slower than at the Belgian GP last year; at the time, Leclerc drove from pole to victory. The Monegasque was nearly half a second short of his 2019 time, while Mercedes and Red Bull improved by around two seconds. Williams even increased by four seconds. While George Russell followed the rest of the group in 19th place in qualifying and was nearly five seconds behind Leclerc, his time as 15 was just 0.462 seconds slower than the Ferrari driver this time.
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