F1: Japanese Grand Prix Qualifying LIVE: Max Verstappen tops first two qualifying sessions

Published on: September 23, 2023

By Will Pickworth For Mailonline

Follow Mail Sport’s live blog for all the latest from the Japanese Grand Prix qualifying as Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez look to reassert Red Bull’s dominance.

Final qualifying results

A hectic 10 minutes but Verstappen takes pole yet again.

A good session for McLaren who take second and third.

The full results are as follows:

Perez flying round

Verstappen looks to have guarenteed pole unless Perez can take him.

No, he can’t. He’s 0.773 seconds behind and the invevitable has happened.

Half a second clear of Piastri and that is the largest pole margin at Suzuka since Michael Schumacher here in 2004.

What a second lap that was from Verstappen!

Ferrari are out

Leclerc and Sainz are now out and hoping to keep up their good recent form.

He’s fourth-tenths of a second behind Verstappen already.

The world champion is attempting to beat his time and is already going quicker than his previous lap after two sectors.

And he’s now extended his advantage.

Windy conditions

It’s sunny in Suzuka but also gusty, with Tsunoda reporting to his team how he was unsettled by the wind.

Meanwhile, Ferrari are yet to sent out either Leclerc or Sainz as they bank on one run at the end.

Meanwhile Russell has posted the fourth-quickest time on the board so far in Q3.

Verstappen sets the pace again

Verstappen races first again after his flying lap after positng a lap time of 1:29:012.

The two McLaren’s are just behind with Piastri slightly ahead of Norris.

Perez is a whole 1.411 seconds bheind his team-mate.

Local favourite Tsunoda is more than two seconds further back.

Top 10 shootout

Just a reminder of who is in the top 10 shootout to battle it out for pole position.

We’ve got: Verstappen, Perez, Hamilton, Piastri, Tsunoda, Norris, Leclerc, Sainz, Russell and Alonso.

Verstappen has begun his flying lap!

Good Morning

And welcome to Mail Sport’s live blog for Japanese qualifying.

Q3 is just about to get underway with Max Verstappen looking in fine form again.