Verstappen blames engine cut-out for costing him pole

Max Verstappen believes that the engine issues he has been suffering this weekend denied him a chance at pole position. The Dutchman finished qualifying an impressive second ahead of Ferrari, Valtteri Bottas and his teammate but says that pole was on the cards but for his engine issue.

Speaking after qualifying, Verstappen explained that he was suffering engine cut-outs all weekend and that had his engine been operating normally, pole position was a realistic prospect for Red Bull.

"From FP3 onwards I was shaking from anger but now I am shaking from happiness," said Verstappen.

"In FP3 just so many problems. Going into false neutral, the car was stopping on track. While driving on my fast laps it was just bogging down, and qualifying was exactly the same story.

"We had to detune the engine and lost a bit of time there to try to make the driveability better, but it still didn't work like it should do.

"Going into Q3 I felt the car was working really well and didn't have anything to complain about, so when I saw second on the board I was actually quite surprised given the problems I had.

"On my final run, I tried to push a bit more and I was another two tenths up. Then I arrived to (Turn) 16/17 and when I had to short shift again the engine just cut out, so I had to abort."

Verstappen finished 0.3s behind pole-sitter Lewis Hamilton but could be in the picture for the race win tomorrow, with the Mercedes driver looking to protect his championship lead from third-placed Sebastian Vettel.