McLaren’s Lando Norris powered back from an early Q3 scare to secure pole position for Formula One’s 2025 Brazilian Grand Prix, while Mercedes driver Kimi Antonelli put together a final flyer to take second on the grid behind the championship leader. The result exactly replicates the front row on the grid for the sprint race that Norris won ahead of Antonelli earlier on Saturday.
Charles Leclerc and Oscar Piastri will make up the second row on Sunday. But the biggest shock of the qualifying came early on, when Max Verstappen was knocked out in Q1.
Q3 came down to minor mistakes compromising laps. After the first runs, Piastri held provisional pole position, which looked to be the Australian rebounding from his sprint race crash. Norris, meanwhile, was down in 10th place after locking up heavily at Turn 1 on his first Q3 flying lap.
For a brief moment, as the final laps unfolded, Leclerc managed to beat Piastri’s first run, but Norris came flying back, with a time 0.294 seconds quicker than the Ferrari driver. The Briton managed to meet the moment despite mounting pressure, and Antonelli was able to do the same, continuing to build on each impressive performance the Italian has logged across this weekend’s sessions.
Piastri, running ahead of Antonelli on the track, could not get back ahead of Leclerc and ended up fourth. At the same time, in the other Mercedes, George Russell made a late gamble to run medium tires compared to the softs everyone else was on. But he could only manage sixth.
In a surprise early in Q3, Pierre Gasly was in the middle of the pack — despite Alpine’s car struggling to perform this season. In the end, he finished ninth, with the Racing Bulls pair of Isack Hadjar and Liam Lawson fifth and seventh. Sauber’s Nico Hülkenberg ultimately took 10th.
Q2: Hamilton eliminated as Bearman shines
For the second time in 24 hours at Interlagos, Lewis Hamilton did not advance to the top 10 shootout in his Ferrari. He qualified P11 and then finished seventh in the sprint race, but he’s set to line up 13th for Sunday’s grand prix. By comparison, Leclerc went fourth fastest in the middle session.
When looking at Hamilton’s lap versus the time Hülkenberg put in to progress in 10th in Q2, the Ferrari driver was only ahead of the Sauber driver in sector one, by 0.062 seconds. Otherwise, Hülkenberg went 0.115 seconds quicker in sector two and 0.062 seconds up in sector three.
Hamilton failed to make it to the final part of qualifying for the second time in the 2025 Brazilian GP weekend (Hector Vivas/Getty Images)
Meanwhile, Bearman and Haas look incredibly strong for back-to-back segments of this qualifying session. Bearman went third quickest in Q1, and was just 0.235 seconds slower than Norris, who went to the top of Q1, and he was 0.139 seconds behind Norris in getting through Q2 with the second fastest time at that stage. He ultimately finished eighth in Q3, but had he replicated his Q2 time, Bearman would’ve qualified third.
Bearman still needs to be careful around this excitement when considering Sunday’s race. He may not be in a title fight, but he picked up another penalty point in Saturday’s sprint race, putting him back on the brink of a race ban. He has nine penalty points on his license, and these won’t start falling off until May 2026, which means he’ll need to push to the limit as any racing driver will, but keep it tidy overall.
Q1: Verstappen’s title hopes hit by shock early exit
In a complete shock, four-time world champion Verstappen was knocked out in Q1, missing the cut to progress by 0.066 seconds. It was a completely clean session — a dry track, with zero yellow or red flags. But Verstappen qualified just 16th after being beaten on pure pace, at a track where he stormed back to win last year in the wet conditions.
This is the Dutchman’s first Q1 exit in over four years, and it was clear that he didn’t know what more could be done to his Red Bull car. Earlier in Q1, Verstappen had told his race engineer, “Oh my god mate, the car and the ride is a tiny bit better, but now (it’s) sliding even more.” He complained during the session about struggling with grip, and he regularly lost a chunk of time in the middle sector during his early laps.
Behind Verstappen, for the first time since Hungary, his teammate Yuki Tsunoda was also knocked out in Q1. The Japanese driver’s best lap was three-tenths of a second off Versatppen’s pace ahead. This shows how Red Bull is struggling with the car, and given the fine margins in F1 these days, it has been hit hard as a result.
A massive shock as Verstappen tumbles out of Q1 😮 #F1 #BrazilGP pic.twitter.com/2CAhLTewSg
— Formula 1 (@F1) November 8, 2025
All this carries implications for the constructors’ and drivers’ championships. Red Bull is in the mix for second in the former, thanks to the team’s recent resurgence in performance since Zandvoort, while Verstappen is 36 points behind drivers’ points leader Norris, having been 104 points off the standings lead leaving the Dutch GP.
Meanwhile, after suffering a heavy crash late in the sprint race, Gabriel Bortoleto watched on in the garage as Sauber rushed to rebuild his car. It came so close to getting the rookie driver out on track, with F1’s cameras panning to show tire blankets being fitted to the car with Bortoleto sitting in the cockpit. He will be allowed to race on Sunday, as F1 rules allow drivers to enter races without qualifying times, so long as they have shown sufficient pace earlier in the event. Bortoleto has satisfied this rule.
The other Q1 fallers were Esteban Ocon and Franco Colapinto, who, like Piastri, were able to take part in qualifying after repairs to their cars were completed following their Turn 3 sprint race crash.
Results:
1. Lando Norris, McLaren
2. Kimi Antonelli, Mercedes
3. Charles Leclerc, Ferrari
4. Oscar Piastri, McLaren
5. Isack Hadjar, Racing Bulls
6. George Russell, Mercedes
7. Liam Lawson, Racing Bulls
8. Ollie Bearman, Haas
9. Pierre Gasly, Alpine
10. Nico Hülkenberg, Sauber
11. Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin
12. Alex Albon, Williams
13. Lewis Hamilton, Ferrari
14. Lance Stroll, Aston Martin
15. Carlos Sainz, Williams
16. Max Verstappen, Red Bull
17. Esteban Ocon, Haas
18. Franco Colapinto, Alpine
19. Yuki Tsunoda, Red Bull
DNS Gabriel Bortoleto, Sauber