George Russell of Mercedes claimed his first pole position in four races in the qualifying session for the sprint race at the Dutch Grand Prix. The British driver, who sits third in the world championship, was 0.041 seconds faster than Lando Norris of McLaren, who qualified second.
Kimi Antonelli, Russell's teammate at Mercedes, could only reach fifth position, behind Charles Leclerc of Ferrari and Oscar Piastri in the second McLaren. Max Verstappen of Red Bull qualified sixth, followed by Lewis Hamilton of Ferrari, who is second in the championship.
Russell said it was "a very good lap" and added that "it's always difficult in sprint qualifying because we only have one lap to get it, but everything went well". The British driver acknowledged that "it's been a while since I was at the top of the times" and noted that the break came at a good moment after losing ground to Antonelli in the three races before the summer break.
Russell was 0.227 seconds ahead of Antonelli and will have the opportunity in Saturday's sprint race to reduce the Italian's points advantage. Norris, winner of the last race before the break in Hungary, said he "could have taken pole position" if he had made the most of the soft tyres used in the final laps of the session.
Leclerc, who was just 0.055 seconds off pole, expressed that it was his "best qualifying lap of the year". Hamilton lamented that "it wasn't a good session" and explained that they made "subtle adjustments to the car" but "it was a completely different car" in qualifying.
Antonelli paid the price for an error in the first session when he went off into the gravel at the entry to the final corner. He indicated that he had "a couple of holes in the floor" caused by loss of aerodynamic load. Behind the drivers of the leading teams, Pierre Gasly was eighth in an Alpine with its first major aerodynamic upgrade in some time.
Aston Martin made significant changes with a redesigned Honda engine, although it faced problems during qualifying. Fernando Alonso, the team's driver, finished last after the straight-line mode failed to function on his car. Alonso noted that he had a "combination of problems" which included "drivability issues with the engine" that made it difficult to brake the car and he could not open the rear wing.
