Qualifying frustration for Lawson, starts 15th

| Photographer Credit: Rudy Carezzevoli/Getty Images

After a solid start in all three practice sessions for both Racing Bull drivers, Liam Lawson and Isack Hadjar, it was a disappointing qualifying session for the 2025 British Formula One Grand Prix that will see the Kiwi start from 15th and the Frenchman from 12th.

“A Q1 exit is really frustrating, especially since we’ve had a fast car all weekend,” commented Lawson. “Unfortunately, the drop in temperature meant we couldn’t get the tyres up to the right temperature, I had no grip starting the lap and it didn’t improve as the lap went on.”

Having qualified 16th fastest, Lawson will start one place higher due to Haas F1 Team ‘s Ollie Bearman receiving a 10-grid penalty for ignoring red flags in the third practice session on Saturday.

“It’s a shame to throw away a Qualifying session like that. These tyres are very sensitive, but that’s nothing new, and we should have handled it better. Starting from where we are, we’ll need to consider an alternative strategy for tomorrow. Anything can happen, the weather here is unpredictable. We’ll push for a top 10 finish, but it’s going to be a tough race.”

Lim Lawson

“After promising sessions through Friday, we felt we were in a relatively strong position going into P3 and Qualifying,” said Tim Goss, Racing Bulls Chief Technical Officer. “Overnight we made further small adjustments to the car setup to try and adapt to the windy conditions, to rebalance the car for the expected cooler track temperatures and to evaluate different downforce levels.

“Whilst these were broadly effective, we ultimately struggled to deliver to meet our expectations in Qualifying. Liam’s car lacked a bit of grip, especially in sector three and we narrowly missed the cut into Q2. Isack progressed comfortably out of Q1, but couldn’t extract enough from the car in Q2. Looking forward to the race we know we have demonstrated good tyre management and are confident that we will have a good shot at a points finish.”

Max Verstappen clinched pole position with the Red Bull driver storming through with a stunning lap to put himself at the front of the grid ahead of the McLarens of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris.

Benjamin Carrell is a freelance motorsport writer and currently edits talkmotorsport.co.nz. He writes for a number of Kiwi drivers and motorsport clubs. That's when he's not working in his horticultural day-job or training for the next road or mtb cycle race!

https://talkmotorsport.co.nz

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