The São Paulo Grand Prix is live on 5 Live and the BBC Sport website
Kevin Magnussen caused a sensation at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix by qualifying his Haas car on pole position for Saturday’s sprint race.
The Dane, who returned to Formula 1 this season after a one-year break, took his and his team’s first pole with a remarkable performance at Interlagos.
Magnussen nailed the only dry lap before a red flag, during which it began to rain.
He will start Saturday’s sprint race ahead of Red Bull’s Max Verstappen.
Mercedes’ George Russell was third, with his team-mate Lewis Hamilton in eighth.
And there was embarrassment for Ferrari, who made the latest in a series of strategic mistakes this season by sending Charles Leclerc out on intermediate tires for the start of the final session.
Ferrari were fooled by the weather forecast predicting rain, but it didn’t come soon enough, and there were reprimands over the radio when Leclerc realized everyone else had managed a lap and would start 10th.
Magnussen was in disbelief, grinning from ear to ear in the car when it became clear the weather was too wet for anyone to improve once the session resumed, then jumped out of the car and celebrated with his team.
How did this happen?
It was an impressive performance from Magnussen and one that will go down as one of the biggest shocks in F1 history.
Haas brought him out on track first so he had a clear lap, and he just nailed the lap and finished 0.207s quicker than two-time champion Verstappen, who admitted he had ruined his own chances by blocking – it’s turn eight.
Before he had returned to the pits, he asked the team where he was. When told, “P1,” he replied, “You’re kidding me. I’ve never felt like this in my life.”
He then warned the team not to celebrate too soon, but when rain fell during the break, his post was set in concrete.
“I don’t know what to say,” Magnussen said afterward. “The team put me on track at exactly the right time. We were first out of the pit lane and we did a pretty decent lap and we’re on pole. It’s amazing.”
Magnussen, let go by Haas at the end of 2020, thanked the team for bringing him back and giving him the chance to revive his career when they dropped Russian Nikita Mazepin after the invasion of Ukraine .
“Thanks to the team, to Gene Haas,” he said. “I’m back this year after a year away and it’s great.”
Haas has struggled since entering the sport in 2016
what else happened
It was Russell who prompted the session-defining red flag: he lost control on lap four attempting a second lap, putting his outside wheels on the white line and spinning into the gravel trap.
It looked like she might get out, when she reached the tarmac evacuation road between the gravel and the barrier, but she spun the Mercedes when she got there and was stranded.
Russell said: “Happy to be P3 and congratulations to Kevin, what a fantastic job he’s done and Haas. P3 isn’t necessarily where we wanted to be, but a really good place to start the sprint race.
“Our best chance of trying to get ahead of Max is to have mixed conditions.”
McLaren’s Lando Norris will start fourth, ahead of Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz and the Alpines of Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso, followed by Red Bull’s Sergio Perez, who was stuck behind Leclerc on his lap.
More consternation from Ferrari
Meanwhile, Ferrari found themselves with more questions to ask about their management of the race after crashing Leclerc’s chances.
They had already had a misunderstanding earlier in practice, when they sought a tire change in the pit lane when they switched from intermediates to slicks during the first qualifying session, and Leclerc was left wondering what was going on as his car sat without wheels with Sainz. waiting behind his tires.
But that was nothing compared to what happened in the third quarter.
The fundamental part of any tire choice is being on the right ones at the right time, but Ferrari went ahead and opted to send Leclerc into the intermediates when the incoming rain hadn’t started.
“I’m the only one in Inters,” asked Leclerc as he exited the pits.
Beyond the lap, he said, “There’s no rain,” but was told, “Rain at Turn 12, we think.”
His engineer then made a frantic call to try to get him to the pits, shouting: “Box, box, box” over the radio as he completed the lap.
But Leclerc, realizing the rain was coming and that this could be his fastest lap of the session even on the wrong tyres, dismissed them. “Boys, I have to push now,” he said.
Afterwards, when asked where she was, she quipped, “Beautiful. Beautiful.” And then he shouted an expletive, frustrated that he had started a race he should have at least been on the front row for in 10th.
“We were hoping for some rain that never came,” he said after getting out of the car. “I’ll talk to the team and try to understand what we can do better in these conditions. Very disappointed. The pace was there, but whatever.”