Marko sees 'The Verstappen factor' making the difference for Red Bull

Max Verstappen has finished in second place in Sprint Qualifying, making Red Bull top advisor Helmut Marko very happy. The Austrian could only praise the Dutch driver following the session, after he narrowly missed out on taking pole position for Saturday's Sprint.

"Incredible," an impressed Marko told Motorsport-Magazin.com. "We completely rebuilt the setup. The handling was clearly improved and then came a mega lap from Max. He made no mistakes at all. The McLarens both made small mistakes, but Max's lap was perfect."

What also stood out for the top advisor was how much Verstappen could improve from SQ2 to SQ3. "We improved on SQ2 by seven tenths, nobody else did that. And that is simply the Verstappen factor," the 81-year-old further praised Verstappen to Sky Sports Germany.

Still, ahead of the Sprint on Saturday, Marko rather not get carried away. "It will be a tough race, I think. It's far from certain that this starting grid will make it to the finish like this," the Austrian concluded in China.

Verstappen finished behind Lewis Hamilton and Ferrari by just 0.018 seconds, and as a result, the two world champions have locked out the front row of the grid. Meanwhile, the two McLaren drivers, Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris, finished in P3 and P6 respectively.

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