"Nicely executed" F1 tow doesn't explain full gap to Hamilton - Verstappen

Verstappen stormed to his 10th pole position of the season ahead of F1 title rival Lewis Hamilton.

Hamilton was the heavy favourite for pole going into qualifying after topping two of three preceding practice sessions, but Verstappen’s 1m22.109s in Q3 proved to be untouchable.

On the run down to Turn 9, Verstappen benefitted from a tow from his teammate.

Speaking after qualifying, Verstappen revealed that it was discussed beforehand but the time gained from it didn’t explain the nearly four-tenth gap to Hamilton.

“Yeah it was discussed before quali,” he said. “It was very nicely executed as well. It’s not whatever the gap was, I might have gained a tenth towards Turn 9, it’s not a massively long straight. 

“Nevertheless, Checo is a great teammate and a real pleasure to work with so also a big thank you to him.”

Verstappen confirmed that they didn’t practice the tow in practice.

“No we didn’t,” he added. “Checo and I said to ourselves we were confident to do it just for that one run and that’s what we did.”

To secure his maiden F1 championship, Verstappen simply needs to finish ahead of Hamilton. 

Even though it’s the biggest day of his career on Sunday, Verstappen says he’s going to be preparing as normal.

“I just need to focus on what we can control as a team and the coming hours, what I think is most important is to have a good sleep but also I have friends and family around so I am not going to do anything different to what I normally have been doing,” he explained.