Max Verstappen was fuming over the timing of the red flag that he thought led to his Q2 exit at Interlagos, resigning him to 17th place on the grid.
Following a crash for Lance Stroll in the closing stages of Q2, race director Niels Wittich threw a red flag with 46 seconds left on the clock. With Verstappen down in 12th and not enough time to set another lap time, the Dutchman was eliminated in Q2.
Verstappen also has to serve a five-place grid penalty due to an engine change, meaning he will be 17th on the grid.
But Verstappen was angry about how long race control took to red-flag the session. It took between 30 and 40 seconds between Stroll’s impact with the barrier and the red flag to come out, during which time Verstappen dropped out of the top 10. Verstappen on Sky Sports F1:
💬 “The car hits the wall, it needs to be a straight red. I don’t understand why it needs to take 30, 40 seconds for a red flag to come out. It’s just bulls—.”
Stroll’s crash caused one of five red flags in Q3. In three of the other cases — the incidents for Franco Colapinto, Fernando Alonso, and Alex Albon — the session was immediately red-flagged due to the severity of the impact, which triggered the medical car deployment. This is done via a g measurement in the cockpit.
Stroll also attempted to get his car back on the road after the crash, but the red flag came out when it was clear that he would not be able to resume.
Red Bull team boss Christian Horner was also frustrated by the red flag timing, saying on Sky Sports there was no way that Stroll would have got going and that it should have immediately been thrown:
💬 “I think we’d just like to understand the thinking of the race director for why it took so long for the red flag.”
With Verstappen’s teammate, Sergio Pérez, also being eliminated in Q2 and set to start 12th, Horner admitted it had “been one of those mornings where nothing goes right for us.”
Pole position for Lando Norris has given the McLaren driver a golden chance to take a big bite out of Verstappen’s championship lead. The gap stands at 44 points but could be far smaller in a few hours if the race goes the distance later today.
