Lando Norris of McLaren suffered a huge setback as he crashed out of Qualifying in Q3, relegating him to 10th on the grid for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix set to he held on April 20 at the Jeddah Circuit.
Rival Max Verstappen of Red Bull is in pole position ahead of McLaren’s and Oscar Piastri Mercedes’ George Russell.
Lando Norris, who leads the driver standings, is however, not too optimistic about his performance in the race.
Norris said: “I don’t think it’s going to be an easy one because I don’t think it’s very easy to overtake around here.
“We have a strong car but clearly not as good as we would like because Max is on pole and George is only 0.1secs behind, so it’s not like things are plain sailing at the minute.
“[I’ve got] a big job to try and do.”
Norris said he was “going to need a bit of luck” in the grand prix. He added that to “get close” to Verstappen, Piastri and Russell was “not very realistic”.
“It’s almost impossible to overtake around here, so I’m not expecting anything magical,” Norris said.
“But we have a good car, so if we can work our way up to the top five, six, I will say I’ll be happy.”
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On the other hand, Verstappen, who is eight points behind Norris in the standings, said he was surprised to have been in the fight for pole after a difficult time through the practice sessions, adding that until taking pole he had been “not very confident” for the race.
“My long runs weren’t particularly great compared to Oscar or Lando,” he said. “Naturally, with how the car was reacting today, it will be a bit better. But I don’t think it’ll be enough to be super competitive.
“But the car definitely took a bit of a step forward compared to what we were testing yesterday. So I hope that will help our tyre life out as well, but difficult to say that gives an opportunity to fight.”
Verstappen’s pole was his second of the season after his first in Japan two weeks ago where he ended up winning the final race.
