Max Verstappen signed a shocking pole position in the Japan GP

The Dutch brought out all his talent in Suzuka to overcome the two McLaren, invincible in the previous one, and picar in Punta on the third date of Formula 1.

McLaren was a number set for pole position in Japan. The big doubt that floated in the environment of Suzuka was whether it would be Lando Norris or Oscar Piastri. But nobody, or almost no one, diudad that the Woking team would occupy the first exit drawer and, probably, would monopolize the initial start of the Japan Grand Prix, the third date of Formula 1. But, of course, nothing is said when there is one Max Verstappen on the track. The Dutchman, with a Red Bull that is shown inferior to MCL39, brought out all his talent to get a Pole Sensoral Position.

Suzuka is an old school circuit. With slow curves, super fast, straight, narrow layout … a place where any small error is paid expensive, a car in which different pilots make a difference. And, of course, while Norris continues to demonstrate that he lacks that final jump to get into the select group of the chosen (He made several small mistakes, but important), to the world’s tetracampeon is left over. And in that final classification, the Dutch rounded a sensational work to get his 41st pole in F1, the fourth consecutive in Suzuka.

Verstappen has been paddling with an indócile RB21, difficult to carry and that was already devoured to Liam Lawson in just two races. But Max is different, unique and takes water from the stones. Thus, in the complicated career of Australia, under the flood, he managed to rescue the second place because he did not fail, when Piastri did. In China he took out what he could from his Red Bull to be fourth and be second in the World Cup, eight points from Norris. Max did not stop crossing in the two weeks of interval between Shanghai and Suzuka, he started working along with the Red Bull engineers.

His initial plan to spend a few days of intimacy with his wife Kelly Piquet, who is about to give birth to the first child of the marriage, had a cut: Max traveled to Milton Keynes on Thursday, March 27 to work all day at the factory, rumming up in the data to try to find the performance of the car of the car. His plane was ready at the airport in case he had to travel urgently back to the Principality before a call to warn him of labor. The meeting was held in the middle of the seizure that was generated by Lawson’s degradation to Racing Bulls, a situation that Max did not like a little. “The problem is the car,” he shouted.

And he arrived in Japan without an apparent solution. The suspicion became a reality when it turned to turn. All Friday he suffered with a very loose tail car, which cost him to put in the curves and did not have good traction. Meanwhile, the McLaren lent themselves leadership. Until the classification came, the hot moment, where everything must be shown. And while Norris was wrong in curve 7 in his first attempted at Q3 and was far away, Max flew.

And in the end he marked 1M26S983 (new circuit record) and had 1. Norris closed and was 12 thousandths! Nothing, the song of a nail, but could not with Max, again. And Piastri was 32 thousandths. The explosion of Verstappen when they told him by radio that he had the pole was eloquent of the moment he lived, and lives, for a car that knows that he is less than McLaren.

Of course, this Sunday will have a more difficult one: endure the attacks of the McLaren Navy. It will be two against one, because for more change of pilots they make, Verstappen is only again (Yuki Tsunoda will start 15). “It was not an easy classification, in each batch we made some improvement and in the last lap it was on the limit. It was very comforting. It is very good to be in pole for tomorrow (this Sunday), it will be difficult to contain the McLaren, there may be some rain. We will try to do our best, ”said Max.

Perhaps the rain is Verstappen’s best friend to be able to endorse that pole position that he did not achieve from the 2024 Austria GP. Since then, 15 races passed without the champion being able to win a classification. The period is not accidental, it is on par with the performance fall of Red Bull, first with the RB20 of last year and that had continuity in the RB21 of 2025. In that period he managed to win in two races (San Pablo and Qatar) and raise another title. Of course, Max is different and is at another level, as he demonstrated in the Suzuka classification.

Further back, and further, Charles Leclerc (fourth, 316 thousandths) and the Mercedes duo, with George Russell and Kimi Antonelli were left. Lewis Hamilton had a disappointing classification and was eighth, behind the surprising Isack Hadjar, 627 thousandths. All, far from Verstappen and McLaren.

Classification result