What's happening to the pole master?
Seven consecutive pole positions in the first seven races of this season, eight on the trot if one takes into account the final round of 2023 in Abu Dhabi, but now, only one in Austria from the last six races. Max Verstappen's mastery of pole position appears to be slipping somewhat at the moment, even if in those five where he failed to secure the top spot on the grid, the gaps to the pole time were minimal: 20 thousandths of a second in Barcelona and 46 yesterday at the Hungaroring, in both cases Lando Norris being quickest, while in Montreal, there was no gap, Max setting exactly the same time as George Russell, the Englishman taking pole by virtue of having set the time first. Only twice were the gaps significant, in Monaco when he was 297 thousandths down on Charles Leclerc and at Silverstone where Russell was 384 quicker, bringing the overall gap from Saturday's defeats to 747 thousandths.
When the Red Bull driver has taken pole, his superiority was clear, always at least a tenth of a second quicker, with the exception of Suzuka (0”066 ahead of Sergio Perez) and Imola (0”074 ahead of Oscar Piastri), for a total of 1”824.
What's going on with the quickest team in the ground-effect era? Actually the percentage of pole positions hasn't changed much over the past few years: 61.5% so far this year, compared to 63.6% last year and in 2022 it was even lower at 54.5%. No, the worrying fact for the Milton Keynes team is that its other driver, Sergio Perez, hasn't even made it to the top ten in almost half this season's races. His year got off to a good enough start, never outside the top six in the first six races after which the Mexican's season spiralled into crisis, culminating in yesterday afternoon's disaster.
What has worked in Red Bull's favour is that its biggest threat seems to come from a different team from race to race. In the first half of the season its main rival appeared to be Ferrari, then McLaren picked up the baton, although it often failed to capitalise on that on Sunday, for example when it looked set to win in Spielberg and Silverstone, before letting Mercedes slip by to claim two wins that seemed unimaginable at the start of the year.
Today could prove to be a turning point. If the team run by Andrea Stella can capitalise on its front row lock-out and go on to win, then the fight for the Constructors' title could be reignited, especially as it's unlikely that Perez will be able to score points from where he is starting. It explains why Max was clearly angry after his second Q3 run yesterday, realising that he had missed out on pole by a whisker, followed by some of his remarks in the press conference later as to his chances of beating the McLarens this afternoon. Was he being deliberately pessimistic? No, as that's not Verstappen's style. It's more likely a realistic assessment, but that doesn't mean he won't be aiming to turn things around and we can expect some fireworks off the start line. Actually, starting third, Max will have the benefit of a slipstream on the long run down to the first corner and the extra grip from being on the clean side of the track. We had the perfect example of the effect of those two factors courtesy of Felipe Massa in 2008 and Sebastian Vettel in 2015…
