Verstappen narrowly seizes pole from Norris: What happened in Japanese GP qualifying

Max Verstappen seized pole position for the 2025 Japanese Grand Prix by just eight-thousandths of a second from Lando Norris, setting up the enticing prospect of a tight victory battle on Sunday, when rain could offer an extra challenge.

Both drivers believed that they had got the most from their cars, suggesting that the pair could remain closely matched during the Grand Prix when third-placed Oscar Piastri will also be looking to join the battle. A small error on his final qualifying run left the Chinese Grand Prix winner just under half-a-tenth of a second behind the top two.

Verstappen, however, will have no immediate support from his team-mate after Yuki Tsunoda was knocked out in the second Q2 stage, having been wrestling with the car that predecessor Liam Lawson struggled with so much.

Tsunoda will start 14th, just one place behind Lawson, who also trailed his Racing Bulls team-mate. Isack Hadjar had his own struggles; his lap belts leaving him in excruciating pain every time he braked. “I can’t focus,” he said over the radio, and only just made it out of Q1. But a readjustment later, he then stormed into the final Q3 stage and qualified seventh, just ahead of Lewis Hamilton.

“I’m just really proud of me,” said Hadjar. “The lap I did in Q1 with what I had — unbelievable… I nearly crashed!”

Hadjar’s later laps were no less impressive. “You feel something different when you know it’s that final lap of Q3,” he told Sky Sports. “You’re like, ‘I’m just going to add a tiny bit more everywhere’. The amount of focus it takes is a lot. I was 100% and I was not previously. “I just managed to be brave enough to take an extra step.”

Another driver lucky to avoid the wall in Q1 was Lance Stroll, who ran wide onto the grass on his final flying lap, leaving him last on the grid. He’ll start alongside Jack Doohan, who was still feeling the effects of a big crash in Friday practice, and behind the two Saubers, as well as the Haas of Esteban Ocon in 18th.

The other side of the Haas garage was more jubilant as Oliver Bearman made it through to Q3 and will start tenth on the grid. Making it look easy, he said: “It’s so much fun. I knew that there wasn’t much left in [the car]”.

Bearman will be alongside Alex Albon, who maintains his 100% record of making it through to Q3 in 2025. Ahead of them is Lewis Hamilton, eighth in a Ferrari that the team is still trying to get to grips with. Running the car higher than in China, where Hamilton was disqualified for too much wear on the underbody plank, engineers are still looking for the right set-up, with Hamilton saying that the car had too much understeer. Charles Leclerc, who starts fourth, went in a different set-up direction, said Hamilton.

Carlos Sainz qualified 12th but will start 15th as a result of a three-place grid penalty for blocking Lewis Hamilton in Q2.

Verstappen, however, spoke of his joy at clinching pole after efforts to improve the Red Bull paid off. “[I felt] a lot of happiness when I crossed the line,” he said. “If you look at how our season started, even through this weekend, I thinkit’s very unexpected and I think that makes it probably a very special one.

“[We’ve been] trying a lot of different things to try and make it more balanced, which it is a bit of a difficulty for us at the moment, and even in qualifying that is still the same. I’m still not happy with the balance of the car, but we are working on it.”

Despite his obvious happiness, the four-time world champion kept his expectations for Sunday’s race in check. ” I don’t know, of course, how fast we’ll be,” he said. “It will be very hard [to keep the McLarens behind]. So far this season, we’ve not been able to to fight them, but it’s not like, you know, we just sit there and accept it. We try to do the very best, and we will give it a good fight tomorrow if we can.

The session was interrupted by another of the grass fires caused by sparks igniting the bone dry verges, but that’s unlikely to be an issue on Sunday. Thunderstorms are forecast overnight at Suzuka, and rain could fall during tomorrow’s race too. Norris said that the situation could be similar to the changeable conditions at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix.

“No-one knows what the weather’s going to be like tomorrow,” he said. “It’s probably going to be a bit of a race like Melbourne, and that was an exciting race for everyone. I think the unknown of the weather is going to make it exciting and nerve-wracking for everyone.”

2025 Japanese Grand Prix qualifying results

*Takes into account three-place grid penalty