George Russell's Q3 Crash Halts WDC Contenders' Qualifying Duel, Norris Takes Pole

Lando Norris and Max Verstappen have been the class of the field throughout the United States Grand Prix weekend after Verstappen clinched his fourth sprint win in a row; both drivers contending for the WDC made it into Q3 for Sunday's Grand Prix.

Norris put up the time to beat of 1:32.33 in Q3 after Verstappen topped both Q1 and Q2. With two minutes remaining, both drivers were out for second attempts when George Russell hit the wall in turn 19, bringing out the yellow flag.

Russell exited his Mercedes W15 and slammed his hands against the Halo in frustration. The British driver qualified Q2 in Sprint qualifying before falling to P5 in Saturday's sprint race.

In the first sector, Verstappen went purple, beating Norris' best sector time, but with Norris right behind, both laps were abandoned around the 1-minute mark when the yellow came out.

"It was a beautiful lap; I was not going to go much quicker than I did," Norris said on his first attempt in Q3.

"[Have] you ever just do a lap and think it’s going to be tough to beat that?" Norris said to James Hinchcliffe.

Ultimately, Norris' first lap time was enough to secure his fifth pole in the last seven races; he's converted two of these poles into wins at Zandervoot and Marina Bay.

For Verstappen, we'll never know if his second lap time would've been enough to pass Norris' first and stay ahead of his second. But the Red Bull driver is just happy to have a car and a lap capable of being on the front row for the first time in four races.

"[The] First lap of Q3, lost quite a bit of time there," Verstappen said to Sky Sports. "Yeah, that’s unfortunate, but I knew we had enough run. Unfortunate, I couldn’t finish the lap, otherwise I think we had a really good shot, but that’s how it goes. Still, on the front row, at least the potential was there to be first."

After an aggressive performance in Saturday's sprint, Carlos Sainz backed it up with third place in qualifying ahead of his Ferrari teammate Charles Leclerc. Ferrari is one of the two teams that will not bring any upgrades to Austin after the three-week break.

After an uneasy start to the weekend, Norris' McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri rebounded for a fifth-place start in Sunday's Grand Prix, followed by Russell. With repairs needed, Russell may drop to the back of the field. His Mercedes teammate is already there, as Lewis Hamilton failed to make it out of Q3; this is the first time that Hamilton has qualified outside of the top five at COTA.

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