{"id":439415,"date":"2025-09-20T21:23:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-20T21:23:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/439415\/"},"modified":"2025-09-20T21:23:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-20T21:23:10","slug":"sainz-overtakes-albon-in-williams-qualifying-battle-%c2%b7-racefans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/439415\/","title":{"rendered":"Sainz overtakes Albon in Williams qualifying battle \u00b7 RaceFans"},"content":{"rendered":"

Carlos Sainz Jnr<\/a> out-qualified his team mate for the fourth event in a row in Baku \u2013 and he did it in style.<\/p>\n

The driver who will join pole-winner Max Verstappen<\/a> on the front row of the grid tomorrow has moved ahead in the qualifying battle at his new team. Here\u2019s more data from today\u2019s qualifying session.
\nGaps between team mates<\/p>\n

Once again there was almost nothing to choose between the McLaren drivers, though Oscar Piastri<\/a> failed to set a lap time in the final round after crashing. He was far from the only driver to do so.<\/p>\n

Alexander Albon<\/a> hit the wall in the first round of qualifying after being the first driver to set a lap time, which explains why the gap between him and Sainz was so large.<\/p>\n

Team mate battles<\/p>\n

The intra-team battle at Williams has swung back and forth all season. Albon qualified ahead in the first three rounds, but after four more events Sainz had overturned his advantage. Albon hit back, pulling as far as 7-4 ahead, but Sainz has now beaten him in five of the last six grand prix qualifying sessions.<\/p>\n

Andrea Kimi Antonelli<\/a> out-qualified George Russell for the first time since the Miami Grand Prix, 10 rounds ago. Liam Lawson also achieved a rare win over Isack Hadjar, and as with Sainz it was his best qualifying position of the season so far.<\/p>\n

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Fernando Alonso 16 \u2013 0 Lance Stroll
George Russell 15 \u2013 2 Andrea Kimi Antonelli
Max Verstappen 14 \u2013 0 Yuki Tsunoda
Charles Leclerc 13 \u2013 4 Lewis Hamilton
Isack Hadjar 11 \u2013 4 Liam Lawson
Gabriel Bortoleto 11 \u2013 6 Nico Hulkenberg
Oliver Bearman 9 \u2013 7 Esteban Ocon
Oscar Piastri 9 \u2013 8 Lando Norris
Carlos Sainz Jnr 9 \u2013 8 Alexander Albon
Pierre Gasly 5 \u2013 3 Franco Colapinto<\/p>\n

Streaks<\/p>\n

Verstappen and the McLaren drivers kept up their record of reaching Q3 at every event this season. However Verstappen now has the most pole positions of any driver this year.<\/p>\n

Out-qualified team mate<\/p>\n

Rank
\nDriver
\nStreak<\/p>\n\n1<\/td>\nFernando Alonso<\/td>\n28<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n2<\/td>\nMax Verstappen<\/td>\n23<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n3<\/td>\nGabriel Bortoleto<\/td>\n7<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n4<\/td>\nCharles Leclerc<\/td>\n5<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n5<\/td>\nCarlos Sainz Jnr<\/td>\n4<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n6<\/td>\nOliver Bearman<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n=<\/td>\nLando Norris<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n8<\/td>\nFranco Colapinto<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n=<\/td>\nAndrea Kimi Antonelli<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n=<\/td>\nLiam Lawson<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

Out-qualified by team mate<\/p>\n

Rank
\nDriver
\nStreak<\/p>\n\n1<\/td>\nLance Stroll<\/td>\n28<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n2<\/td>\nYuki Tsunoda<\/td>\n15<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n3<\/td>\nNico Hulkenberg<\/td>\n7<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n4<\/td>\nLewis Hamilton<\/td>\n5<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n5<\/td>\nAlexander Albon<\/td>\n4<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n6<\/td>\nEsteban Ocon<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n=<\/td>\nOscar Piastri<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n8<\/td>\nIsack Hadjar<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n=<\/td>\nPierre Gasly<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n=<\/td>\nGeorge Russell<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

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Q1 eliminations and Q3 appearances<\/p>\n

Eliminated in Q1<\/p>\n

Rank
\nDriver
\nStreak<\/p>\n\n1<\/td>\nFranco Colapinto<\/td>\n3<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n2<\/td>\nPierre Gasly<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n3<\/td>\nNico Hulkenberg<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n=<\/td>\nAlexander Albon<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n=<\/td>\nEsteban Ocon<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

Reached Q3<\/p>\n

Rank
\nDriver
\nStreak<\/p>\n\n1<\/td>\nLando Norris<\/td>\n24<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n2<\/td>\nOscar Piastri<\/td>\n21<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n3<\/td>\nMax Verstappen<\/td>\n20<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n4<\/td>\nCharles Leclerc<\/td>\n10<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n5<\/td>\nGeorge Russell<\/td>\n9<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n6<\/td>\nYuki Tsunoda<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n=<\/td>\nAndrea Kimi Antonelli<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n8<\/td>\nCarlos Sainz Jnr<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n=<\/td>\nIsack Hadjar<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n=<\/td>\nLiam Lawson<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

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2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix
\nBrowse all 2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix articles<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Carlos Sainz Jnr out-qualified his team mate for the fourth event in a row in Baku \u2013 and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":439416,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4103],"tags":[145453,21187,20601,4199,707,4200,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-439415","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-f1","8":"tag-2025-azerbaijan-grand-prix","9":"tag-alexander-albon","10":"tag-carlos-sainz-jnr","11":"tag-f1","12":"tag-formula-1","13":"tag-formula1","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115238731963936894","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439415","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=439415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439415\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/439416"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=439415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=439415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=439415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}