Verstappen takes US sprint pole with Norris fourth

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen took rod for the sprint contention astatine the United States Grand Prix, with rubric rival Lando Norris 4th successful his McLaren.

Verstappen, who heads Norris by 52 points with six races to go, pipped Mercedes operator George Russell to rod presumption by 0.012 seconds.

Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc was 3rd fastest, 0.226secs slower than Verstappen, and Norris was 0.250secs disconnected the gait successful fourth.

Mercedes operator Lewis Hamilton was seventh, splitting the Haas drivers Nico Hulkenberg and Kevin Magnussen.

Norris’ team-mate Oscar Piastri was knocked retired successful the archetypal league due to the fact that his thigh clip was deleted for exceeding way limits astatine the penultimate country and volition commencement the sprint 16th.

Red Bull’s Sergio Perez was knocked retired successful the 2nd league and volition commencement 11th.

The sprint event, for which determination are 8 points for a win, 7 for 2nd and truthful connected down to eighth place, is connected Saturday astatine 19:00 BST.

The effect was a stroke to Norris, who needs to adjacent connected Verstappen astatine an mean of astir 9 points a race, particularly arsenic some Red Bull and McLaren are among the teams with upgrades connected their car this weekend.

Verstappen, who had not qualified fastest since the Belgian Grand Prix astatine the extremity of July, said: "We had a bully day. The car was moving rather good and blessed to beryllium first. It’s been a while."

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