Eh, that was the 2nd biggest problem. It's been a trend since the first race in Australia. Intermediates overheat very quickly if the racing line becomes dry and MCL is the best at keeping them in check whereas, RBR and MERC started losing pace relative to them.
I don't think so. Norris was 1s faster than Max, in his final Q3 lap, just that his mistake at T14 reduced it to 3 tenths. The McL39 isn't 1s faster than the RB21 on dry tyres. This quali session was all about 'who warms up their tyres best even before hitting T1 on a flying lap' - Norris and Mclaren did a superior job than Max and Redbull. It's that simple. Remember, Max had to do double-warmup laps in the FP sessions before his quali sim run, others didn't have to.
yeah, sure, but if you want to take pole on an improving track, you can't start your final lap with 1:30 to go.
Because the original plan was the do 2 consecutive push laps at the end, but quickly into the 2nd last lap they released that 1 push 1 cool was the best. So, max aborted the 2nd last lap at the end of sector 2 and had just sector 3 to cool the tires.search wrote: ↑22 Nov 2025, 09:06yeah, sure, but if you want to take pole on an improving track, you can't start your final lap with 1:30 to go.
Not that the lap was particularly good anyway, with Sainz setting the same lap time even earlier, but it of course played a part in the battle with Norris.
As the laps got faster they probably reached the cross-over point of having to do recharge laps. I don't think the slow laps which we saw people doing had anything to do with tyres overheating. It was damp and cold. Smooth track, low abrasiveness.
But GP said they had enough battery for push on both laps at the lap times they were doing, even said he could push and hold overtake button on the straights, so I'm assuming that'd be the case for others too. Cold conditions would mean double push was the better option but that wasn't the case.
