MICHAEL LAMONATO

Max Verstappen dominated the fight for pole position at the Spanish Grand Prix after Sergio Perez, Charles Leclerc and George Russell all failed to make it through to Q3.

Verstappen has been peerless all weekend at a circuit that has accentuated his Red Bull Racing car’s strongest qualities. The Dutchman was so good in qualifying that he didn’t bother to complete his final flying lap despite setting a purple middle sector. He still ended the day with a half-second advantage. After the first runs he had been 0.924s ahead of the pack.

“The car was really good,” he said after clocking 1m 12.272s for pole. “The car was on rails and was really enjoyable to drive today.

Max Verstappen completed a clean sweep of Spanish grand prix practice after a rain-affected final practice session in Barcelona.

Dark clouds rolled over the circuit and lightning was striking in the distance as FP3 went green, and drivers were queued at the end of the pit lane on slick tires in a bid to validate overnight set-up changes before the forecast rain arrived.

Verstappen quickly rocketed to the top of the time sheet with a lap of 1m 13.664, and teammate Sergio Perez followed 0.25s further back, but the session was halted after just eight minutes when Logan Sargeant crashed his Williams at the final corner.

Max Verstappen has swept Friday practice with another session-topping time in a close-run FP2 ahead of local favourite Fernando Alonso.

Verstappen lowered the day’s benchmark to 1m 13.907s with his single push lap on the soft-compound tire early in the session, and no-one who followed was able to better it.

Alonso, who had spent first practice earlier in the day evaluating car upgrades, got closest. The Spaniard strung together a lap just 0.17s shy of the Dutchman, including the fastest time in the final split.