Motor racing-Norris on pole for Qatar sprint, McLaren ahead of Ferrari
Norris takes pole with Russell alongside
Piastri third as McLaren keep Ferrari behind
Ferrari drivers fourth and fifth
Perez only 16th
Adds quotes and details
By Alan Baldwin
DOHA, Nov 29 (Reuters) -McLaren's Lando Norris took pole position for the Qatar Grand Prix sprint on Friday with Mercedes' George Russell denying the Formula One leaders a front row lockout by pushing Oscar Piastri down to third.
McLaren are leading Ferrari in the championship by 24 points with two rounds remaining and a first constructors' title since 1998 tantalisingly close.
Norris lapped the floodlit Lusail circuit with a best time of one minute 21.012 seconds with Russell 0.063 slower and Australian Piastri, last year's sprint winner in Qatar, 0.159 off the pace.
"A great qualifying, especially to bounce back from where we were in Las Vegas. It's a nice thing to do," said Norris, whose title hopes finally evaporated in the Nevada desert last Saturday.
"We were coming here to get pole and we did that, so job done today.
"Our target is a one-two. We want to maximise points for the constructors'. We want to go for it," he added.
The sprint winner takes eight points on Saturday.
Ferrari's Carlos Sainz qualified fourth with team mate Charles Leclerc fifth, and 0.027 slower, with newly-crowned four-times champion Max Verstappen sixth for Red Bull and Mercedes' Lewis Hamilton seventh.
Pierre Gasly will line up eighth, the last scoring position, for Alpine with Nico Hulkenberg ninth for Haas and Liam Lawson 10th for Red Bull.
Verstappen's team mate Sergio Perez qualified only 16th, the latest in a string of disappointing performances by the struggling Mexican whose place for 2025 looks increasingly unlikely despite having a contract.
"We had an issue with one of the anti-roll bars," explained Perez, who said he lost a couple of tenths fighting Leclerc for track position.
Leclerc said fourth and fifth for Ferrari was a return to earth for the Italian team.
"We gave it our all and are only P4 and P5, which is not great considering how important this weekend is," said the Monegasque.
"This I will say is in line with what we expected. We are coming back to reality."
Sainz, who has just two race weekends left at Ferrari before making way for seven-times champion Hamilton and moving to Williams, said the car felt better balanced.
"We didn’t maximise our package. Even though the lap was clean there was a lot of understeer in the car, and I just couldn’t turn the car basically for the whole lap," said the Spaniard.
"I think tomorrow we have potential to improve a lot the car, especially on the soft tyre, and that will mean that we can hopefully make some steps forward."
Argentine rookie Franco Colapinto qualified last for Williams.
Reporting by Alan Baldwin, editing by Pritha Sarkar
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