Simply beautiful

Chapter sixteen:

Aaliyah's Pov:

We walked round the paddock for a while,stopping a few times so lando can take pictures with fans. Lando tells us about the different places/buildings and what happens there. Lots of people are walking up and down, most of them in team apparel. As we were walking back through the paddock we got stopped by Martin Brundle from sky sports.

"Hey Lando how are you?" Martin asks.
"I am doing Alright how are you?" Lando reply's. "I am good thankyou. So what do you think the new car updates?" I think they are good.We have 10 upgrades and most of them are at the front of the car," he said.

"It's an entirely new front wing, it's a new front corner, new front suspension geometry, and new front brake duck.
These upgrades are all about getting the front of the car to work better in low-speed corners and hopefully a quicker car.It definitely should be obvious for when I'm behind the wheel in terms of finding some good steps forward. But it's not necessarily directed at helping all of our weaker areas, which is something we're still aiming for and working very hard to try and improve" he adds. Martin turns towards me. "are you enjoying your weekend so far?" He asks. I give a small smile and then respond with " yes it's a a great experience. I am so grateful for the opportunity to experience this." Martin then asks Mattheo the same question. "It's so cool. I met my best friend and I get to watch him race which is even cooler! I even got to sit in the car!" He says excitedly.

"I will let you get back to what you were doing before . It was nice meeting you guys see you later" Martin says. "Bye, nice to meet you too. Have a great day" I say as we continue our walk to the garage.

Some questions still remained over whether Lando's and Lance's cars will be entirely fixed in time for the session getting underway at 4pm, given that they both had to retired from the Sprint due to damage during a Lap 1 multi-car collision.

The hours between the sprint race and the qualifying has flown by. It is now time for qualifying. The concerns from earlier seemed to me overthinking and panicking because , as the light went green for Q1, Lando was ready to leave the McLaren garage while Stroll is amongst a long queue in the pit lane.
This queue caused issues for Zhou who appeared to push in ahead of Ricciardo. This incident will be investigated after the session has finished. Meanwhile, on track, the majority of the field had headed out to put some early laps in on the soft tyre.
Verstappen joined the fray a little later and raised concerns over the sound of the clutch in his RB20 upon leaving the pits for his out lap, but this did not prevent him from going fastest with a time of 1.28.023s as Q1 approached its halfway point, displacing Sainz at the top.

With the clock ticking down, the names at risk in the elimination zone also continued to change. Traffic seemed to be causing some issues again. Verstappen voiced a complaint about the Alpines, and Sargeant fumed that Tsunoda has ruined him.In the final minutes, yet another queue had formed in the pit lane as everybody prepared for their last flying laps. Perez got himself into P1 and returned to the pits, while the rest of the pack were on track as many battled to avoid being eliminated from the session. Sargeant initially hauled himself out of danger in front of his local fans before being pushed down the order to P17 as others improved, while Bottas also just missed the cut in P16.

Gasly  has had recent qualifying struggles by impressively going fifth fastest, while a big shock came courtesy of Ricciardo who,after a strong weekend so far,was eliminated in P18, having seemingly experienced a snap on his flying lap.
His woes continue further as a three-place grid drop,given due to an incident last time out in China,will push him to the back of the pack. Also exiting in Q1 were Magnussen in the Haas and Kick Sauber's Zhou Guanyu.

The results for Q1 are:

1.) Verstappen 11.) Ocon
2.Perez 12.) Tsunoda
3.) Norris 13.) Albon
4.) Sainz 14.) Hulkenberg
5.) Gasly 15.) Alonso
6.) Piastri ELIMINATION ZONE:
7.) Leclerc 16.) Bottas
8.) Russell 17.) Sargeant
9.) Hamilton 18.) Magnussen
10.) Stroll 19.) Zhou
20.) Ricciardo

After an initially quiet start to Q2, a flurry of cars soon headed out on track. Leclerc set the pace as the first timed laps were put on the board, with a time of 1.27.533s.
While much of the pack were running soft tyres, Verstappen and Perez had opted for used, meaning that they were not at the very top of the timesheets during those first runs.
Double yellow flags were thrown when Albon drove straight on at Turn 17. The Williams driver was able to get going again, but reported that his tyres were destroyed. Ahead of the crucial flying laps, some big names have dropped in the elimination zone, including Hamilton and both Aston Martin drivers. Interestingly, Lando decided to take a gamble by bolting on the medium compound for his final run.
As the last times came in, Hamilton put himself up into an eye-catching third to escape danger, while Leclerc led the way in P1.

The results for Q2 are:

1.) Leclerc
2. Verstappen
3.) Hamilton
4.) Piastri
5.) Perez
6.) Norris ELIMINATION ZONE:
7.) Sainz 11.) stroll
8.) Russell 12.) Gasly
9.) Tsunoda 13.) Ocon
10.) Hulkenberg 14.) Albon
15.) Alonso

Hulkenberg led the pack out as Q3 got underway, running used soft tyres. Most of the field had chosen fresh softs, while Lando had again decided the used medium compound.
Verstappen secured provisional pole position during the initial runs, with the Red Bull setting a lap of 1.27.241s which put him 0.141s clear of Leclerc in second, while Sainz had gone third fastest.
Hamilton was pushed down to eighth, having looked to be fighting the Mercedes during his lap. Meanwhile Race Control had noted a potential impeding incident involving Hulkenberg and Sainz, though soon announced that there would be no further investigation.

All eyes soon turned to the final flying runs as the last minutes of the session arrived. While Lando swapped to the soft rubber this time, Hamilton and Russell had both switched to medium tyres.Despite setting a purple first sector, Verstappen failed to improve on his earlier lap but this proved to be enough to keep him in P1, with others also not going faster. This included Leclerc, who kept P2 ahead of team mate Sainz in P3.

The results for Q3 are:

1.) Verstappen
2. Leclerc
3.) Sainz
4.) Perez
5.) Norris
6.) Piastri
7.) Russell
8.) Hamilton
9.) Hulkenberg
10.) Tsunoda