F1 News: Verstappen wins pole for 2025 GP of Saudi Arabia

Driving the inferior Red Bull RB21, Max Verstappen proved why he is the greatest F1 driver in history by turning a lap of 1m27.294s with the RB21 sled to win the pole position for the 2025 GP of Saudi Arabia at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit.

–by Mark Cipolloni–

How good is Verstappen?  His teammate Yuki Tsunoda in the identical car, was 0.910s slower down in 9th position.  Verstappen is the first repeat pole winner of 2025 and it was his 42nd career pole. His time was a new lap record around the Jeddah Corniche Circuit.

“Very happy! I definitely didn’t expect to be on pole here,” said Verstappen. “The car came alive in the night, we made some final changes, and it was more enjoyable to drive, the grip was coming to me.

“I think tomorrow in the race, it will be tough to keep the McLarens behind, but we’ll give it a good go.”

Replay of Max’s mega lap to get his 2nd pole in 2025pic.twitter.com/Wm72MszXGj

— RBR Daily (@RBR_Daily) April 19, 2025

Verstappen beat the superior #81 McLaren of Oscar Piastri by 0.010s who will start on the outside of the front row.

“There wasn’t much more left in it, so happy with the lap I did,” said Piastri. “The last lap felt like more or less the best I could have done. Max did a good job at another high-speed circuit, where they seem to do well.

“It’s tough around here, once you fall out of rhythm it is hard to get back into it. It’s a difficult track for sure, but at night, soft tires, high grip – it is one of the best tracks we go to.”

George Russell will start third for Mercedes, just 0.113s behind Verstappen.

“Before the session I would have been happy with P3, but seeing how close it is… You always think there is a little more in it. It was a tricky session with the red flag, that one lap at the end was all that counted,” said Russell.

“P3, great place to start and a long race tomorrow.”

Charles Leclerc was 4th in the #16 Ferrari, 0.376s behind Verstappen.

Kimi Antonelli rounded out the top-5 in the 2nd Mercedes, 0.572s behind Verstappen

Carlos Sainz Jr. (Williams), Lewis Hamilton (Ferrari), Yuki Tsunoda were 6th thru 9th.

Despite driving the superior McLaren, Lando Norris hit the turn 4 curb hard on his first Q3 run, lost control, and smacked the outside wall in Turn 5 bringing out the red flag. The car will require repairs and Norris will start 10th.

Full footage of Lando Norris’ crash in Q3!#F1 #Formula1 #SaudiArabianGP #LandoNorrispic.twitter.com/yHVkb8dNpO

— Extreme Cars (@extremecars__) April 19, 2025

There are four different teams in the top four – Red Bull, McLaren, Mercedes and Ferrari. Four in-form drivers too.

One driver who will not be smiling tonight is Norris. He knows he got that one a little wrong, in a night of fine margins. And even worse – he seemed to have the slightest of edges on his teammate too, which won’t happen every weekend.

He will start P10, assuming his gearbox survived the accident. He will certainly recover from there, but how high? Everyone ahead of him will put up a fight, and tire degradation will be higher for him than the leaders.

Strategy is an unknown with softer tires here than last year, track position is king and those barriers will continue to loom large.

Verstappen starts on pole – the last time he did so, he won in Japan. Can he do so again? Two wins from the first five races would be an incredible effort in a car that is absolutely not the class of the field – i.e. a sled.

2025 GP of Saudi Arabia Qualifying Results