‘We know there’s history…’ Horner wary of Hamilton, Verstappen sharing front row

Verstappen was beaten to pole by just 0.003s by Hamilton, who was the fastest qualifier for the first time since the 2021 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.

Red Bull are unbeaten in F1 2023, winning all 10 of the races so far this season.

Speaking to Sky Sports after qualifying on Saturday, Horner mentioned the “history” between Hamilton and Verstappen, referring to the pair’s numerous crashes in their title head-to-head in 2021.

“All credit to Lewis and Mercedes,” Horner said. “It was a very strong lap at the end. You can see that with the history and the amount of poles Lewis has had here. It was a big lap. We left a bit on the table, Max had a snap at Turn 13. But second on the grid, the front row of the grid is still very good.

“I think that track position here is a bit like Monaco without the barriers. Once you have track position it’s very hard to overtake here so it comes down to strategy.

“We have got better race pace than we tend to have qualy pace. It will come down to the start and we know there’s a bit of history between those two. 

“As long as they make it through the first couple of turns, we should have a good motor race.”

Red Bull introduced a significant upgrade for this weekend but it appears they’ve taken a step back.

Horner believes it’s too early to judge its true impact.

“I think that it’s still early days,” he added. “The numbers that are coming through are as expected. It’s a very different type of circuit here. 

“You’ve got to look at things over two or three different types of venues. It’s going to make a couple of races just to absolutely sort things out. 

“I think Max wasn’t that happy with the car. You could hear he wasn’t getting from the car what he wanted in qualy but it’s going to be another 10 degrees hotter tomorrow and that’s going to play havoc again with the car balances in the race.”