F1 Qualifying Results 2021 USA Grand Prix

Event: USA F1 Grand Prix
Track: Circuit of the Americas

Max Verstappen driving the (33) Red Bull Racing RB16B Honda during qualifying ahead of the F1 Grand Prix of USA at Circuit of The Americas (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)

Weather: dry 30.0°C
Tarmac: dry 37.7°C
Humidity: 54.3%
Wind: 1.2 m/s SE
Pressure: 991.6 bar

Max Verstappen qualified as quickest for the 12th time in his F1 career and scored pole position for tomorrow's USA Grand Prix. The Red Bull driver will start from P1 for 9th time this season. It was the 72nd pole for the Red Bull Racing F1 team.

Q1
A lot of cars came out the pits to get a lap on the timesheet, because their was a small chance of rain, according the weather forecast. After all drivers had set a lap time, Max Verstappen came up as quickest. The Red Bull Racing driver had clocked a 1:34.352 min. His team mate Sergio Perez was second on only 0.017s behind on P2 and Daniel Ricciardo was third in the McLaren on 0.055s.

Title rival Lewis Hamilton was +0.445s behind on P7 in the Mercedes with Valtteri Bottas in front of the Fin on P6 and 0.307 behind Verstappen.

With 5 minutes to go Fernando Alonso (Alpine), Nicholas Latifi (Williams), Mick Schumacher (Haas), Kimi Raikkonen (Alfa Romeo) and Nikita Mazepin (Haas) were the ones in the drop zone. Alonso improved enough to get into Q2. Unfortunately Aston Martin driver Lance Stroll swapped places with the Spanish driver, because he improved his lap time.

Q2
Both Mercedes drivers went out as first on the medium tyres, to try and get through Q2 on them and start the race on medium. Both Red Bulls, McLarens, Charles Leclerc (Ferrari), Pierre Gasly (AlphaTauri) and Esteban Ocon (Alpine) also used the yellow medium tyres in their first run. Verstappen ended up as first after the first stint with a 1:33.464, behing over 0.3s quicker than his F1 title rival Hamilton.

The second stint was kicked off by Perez. The drivers who had to improve to get into Q3 were: Perez, Ricciardo, George Russell (Williams), Vettel and Antonio Giovinazzi (Alfa Romeo). Perez and Ricciardo did improve and accomplished to get into Q3.

Q3
Hamilton was the first to go out in Q3 to set the first lap time. After the first stint Perez came out as quickest with a 1:33.180 min and was faster than Verstappen for the firs time this season. The Mexican driver was only 0.019s faster. Hamilton didn't came close in the firs stint and was alsmost 0.4s behind Perez.

In the second stint both Mercedes' drivers went out as first, but couldn't improve enough to challenge the Red Bulls for pole. Verstappen put in an awsome lap when it started to drizzle and took his 12th pole.

The pole time of last time was a 1:32.029min. Set by Hamilton with the Mercedes W11.

Qualifying Times 2021 USA GP

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Leopold

Leopold Pleijsier founded F1-Fansite.com in 2001 and has followed Formula 1 since the early 1980s. He writes about daily F1 news, race weekends, drivers and the sport’s history.

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