Red Bull upgrade puts Verstappen on first 2026 pole at Sepang

Max Verstappen took his first pole position of 2026 at Sepang on Saturday as Formula 1 returned to the Sepang track for the first time since 2017, ahead of Sunday's Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia. Red Bull's upgrade, centred on a new floor, produced the performance that prompted Verstappen to say: "It's been an incredible result for us."

Lewis Hamilton joined Verstappen on the front row in what was his equal best grid position of the year, but he was nearly 0.3 seconds slower in qualifying and said his mindset on Saturday was to "just try my best to hold on to him tomorrow". The pole was Verstappen's first of the year; last season he came within two points of winning a fifth world title after what the article describes as one of the all-time great fightbacks. Red Bull began the year off the pace, with the car on average more than 0.5secs a lap slower than Mercedes in the first half of the year, and there had been questions over Verstappen's future before he signed a two-year contract extension over the summer break after approaches from McLaren, saying he believed in the Red Bull project and didn't mind putting in the work to turn things around.

Verstappen arrived in Malaysia on the back of three consecutive podium finishes and with Red Bull aiming to validate an upgrade that had left them less than 0.2secs off victory in Baku last Sunday. In the tropical heat and around Sepang's long corners on what the article describes as perhaps the roughest surface of the season, the new floor "has more than proved its worth," according to the report, a view reinforced by Verstappen's additional comments about season progression: "Looking at the season, how it started for us and the progression that we have made. At some tracks we were kind of close, but now I think this weekend it was very positive for us."

Team-mate Isack Hadjar, who missed the first three races after the summer break with a wrist broken while boxing as part of his training programme, qualified third but will start eighth after a grid penalty for exceeding his permitted number of engine parts. Hadjar said: "I jumped in a car that's way better than when I left it in Budapest." He added: "Definitely, when you step out actually for three races and you come back, you actually notice a bigger difference. And the last two weekends have been surprising."

A stable car balance should be valuable in a race expected to be dominated by tyre degradation in the stifling heat, whether the threatened rain holds off or not. Mercedes' Kimi Antonelli under-performed slightly in qualifying after a combination of an unusual tyre strategy and an error on an early run, while the report notes "the world championship leader's fourth place becomes third on the grid with Hadjar's penalty, and he can usually be relied upon to be a factor in the race." George Russell starts four places behind Antonelli, trailing the Italian by 66 points, with his momentum from his Baku win described in the article as stalled and his team perplexed at a lack of pace.

Mercedes brought an aerodynamic upgrade this weekend—their first big update since the Canadian Grand Prix in June—but it has not produced the step they had expected, the report says, and questions remain whether that is down to the parts themselves or the very specific conditions of this weekend that are putting the tyres through the mill and limiting useful laps for set-up work. Antonelli described the challenge with the new package: "With this new package, obviously the window of the way the car operates is different. So, we're trying to understand in which window the car performance is best, in the high-speed corner and low-speed corners. "Our high-speed performance has been very strong this weekend. We were very quick in the high-speed, but in the low-speed we lacked. So, we need to understand why and try to move on and improve."

Antonelli outlined the race priorities and strategic variables he expects: "Track position is going to be very important. Strategy is going to be really important. "It's a race where we will attack. Because undercut (stopping first and gaining time on a rival on fresh tyres) is incredibly powerful. "So whenever there's an opportunity, we should go for maybe an undercut and try to maximise our opportunity. "Tomorrow might be two stops, three stops. We don't know. But the only thing we know is that it's going to be roasting hot out there." Sunday's Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia will decide whether Red Bull's upgrade and Verstappen's pole convert into a race win.