Max Verstappen has claimed pole position while Lewis Hamilton has struggled with his car at the French Grand Prix.
Max Verstappen will head the French Grand Prix grid after beating Lewis Hamilton in a duel for pole position.
The Dutchman started the qualifying hour as the form man after final practice, but Hamilton’s mechanics were busy making changes to the Briton’s Mercedes as the session began to cure its uneasiness on the soft tire.
After the pair’s first laps in Q3 Verstappen led the way, his advantage a seemingly unimpeachable 0.4s. Hamilton, however, had more than that up his sleeve for his second lap and improved enough to pinch what would have been provisional pole — only for the Red Bull Racing driver to find an extra 0.3s with his only own attempt and seal the deal.
Continue reading on RACERMax Verstappen narrowly bested Valtteri Bottas for the fastest time of an intriguing second practice for the French Grand Prix at the Circuit Paul Ricard, despite the two drivers using different tire compounds.
Verstappen came through late with a lap on the soft tire to top Bottas by just 0.008s, but neither Bottas nor Mercedes teammate Lewis Hamilton could keep the grippiest compound alive for long enough to set a contending time.
Bottas’s best effort was instead set on the medium compound — his best on the soft was more than 0.3s off the pace — while Hamilton was 0.253s adrift on the qualifying rubber.
Continue reading on RACERValtteri Bottas opened the French Grand Prix with the fastest time of first practice, but his Mercedes team was fuming about high curbs damaging his car.
Bottas had a 0.335s advantage over teammate Lewis Hamilton, but he was an early victim of the aggressive curbs dotted around the track, incurring damage to his front wing and requiring his first spare to be fitted just minutes into the session.
Circuit Paul Ricard has had a series of narrow, tall “baguette” curbs installed just beyond the regular red and white strips to deter drivers from running wide over the track’s vast expanses of asphalt, but they proved to be car destroyers based on the first hour of running.
Continue reading on RACERWe stalk Jost Capito on LinkedIn and talk about the Big D of 2015, which is not a Manscaped reference and will make more sense later. We accidentally have a genuinely good idea.
