Russell Claims Pole Position in Dramatic Las Vegas Qualifying as Williams Suffers Another Crash
George Russell secured his third pole position of the season in Las Vegas, leading Carlos Sainz and Pierre Gasly in a qualifying session disrupted by Williams rookie Franco Colapinto's heavy crash.
The session's Q3 phase was delayed by over 20 minutes following Colapinto's incident at Turn 16, which damaged barriers and scattered debris across the track. As track temperatures dropped to 57°F, grip became increasingly challenging.
Mercedes F1 car racing at speed
Russell claimed pole with a time of 1m32.312s, edging out Sainz by 0.098s despite the Spaniard's two-lap warm-up strategy. Gasly impressed with third place for Alpine, marking the team's best qualifying result of the season.
The top 10 was completed by:
- Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) - 4th
- Max Verstappen (Red Bull) - 5th
- Lando Norris (McLaren) - 6th
- Yuki Tsunoda (RB) - 7th
- Oscar Piastri (McLaren) - 8th
- Nico Hulkenberg (Haas) - 9th
- Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes) - 10th
Notable incidents included Colapinto's crash, marking Williams' sixth major incident in three events, and Sergio Perez's Q1 elimination, continuing his recent qualifying struggles.
F1 Las Vegas Qualifying Results
Valtteri Bottas will start from the back following an energy store penalty, while Lance Stroll managed only one flying lap after technical issues in FP3 required an energy recovery system change.
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