Only twice this season - in a treacherous wet shootout in Canada and last time out at Spa prior to serving a gearbox penalty - had he been even further in front.
With Charles Leclerc crashing and Red Bull team-mate Sergio Perez running some 1.313s adrift of Verstappen’s 1min10.567s flier, it was left to Lando Norris to complete the front row and double underline McLaren’s turnaround. He pipped Mercedes racer George Russell to finish as the runner-up.
But soon after celebrating - and noting how infrequently Verstappen makes a mistake to leave the door open to rivals - Norris bemoaned “one of the worst second halves [of a lap] that I’ve done”. He reckoned the first part of his Q3 lap was “mega” before the driver “peaked” too soon.
The GPS data indicates Norris was right to talk up the first part of his lap. Of the 14-corner, 2.65-mile Zandvoort lap, the McLaren driver was faster than Verstappen through to Turn 7. His first sector would prove 0.037s quicker.
Once the straight-line efficiency of the RB18 has again made itself known across the line, with Verstappen carrying 3.7mph more into the braking zone of Turn 1, Norris hits the first apex some 6.8mph faster to pull 0.185s ahead. The Red Bull fights back through the higher-speed Turn 2 snake but it’s the papaya machine that still leads by 0.083s.
Norris then begins to rebuild his near-0.2s cushion through the banked Turn 3. This rapid run through a tighter turn, like the first corner, reflects the peak downforce gains McLaren has made with its three-stage upgrade package.
For the kinked and undulating straight that follows, however, again the straight-line prowess of the Red Bull comes to the fore as Verstappen closes in. The delta drops to 0.069s, but it is still in Norris’ favour until Turn 7.
Source: Autosport