Max Verstappen secured pole position for the sprint race of the Miami Grand Prix in the Abu Dhabi Autonomous Racing League. The updated McLaren, described as a “almost a b-spec car” by CEO Zak Brown, showed promise in the initial qualifying but struggled in SQ3. Lando Norris, driving the McLaren, led SQ1 and SQ2 on medium tires, but had difficulty in warming up the soft tires. As a result, Norris finished ninth in qualifying. Verstappen, despite driving a challenging Red Bull, clinched pole position, just over a tenth of a second faster than Charles Leclerc in the Ferrari. Sergio Perez finished in third, while Daniel Ricciardo impressed by finishing fourth. Carlos Sainz, Oscar Piastri, Lance Stroll, Fernando Alonso, Norris, and Nico Hulkenberg completed the top 10.
On the other hand, Mercedes struggled with their main upgrade package. Both George Russell and Lewis Hamilton had difficulty putting in a competitive lap during qualifying and were eliminated in SQ2, finishing 11th and 12th respectively. There is also the possibility of further setbacks for Mercedes as they are being investigated for an incident in the pits. Esteban Ocon, Kevin Magnussen, and Yuki Tsunoda also faced challenges in qualifying.
In a disappointing turn of events, Logan Sargeant, driving for Williams, failed to advance to SQ2 due to an error in the first sector. Despite this, Sargeant still outperformed his teammate Alex Albon for the first time. Albon had his fastest time deleted for cutting the chicane and will start behind Sargeant on the last row of the grid for the sprint race. The possibility of a Williams full last row depends on whether Valtteri Bottas will be penalized for impeding Piastri during qualifying. Bottas finished 18th, behind Zhou Guanyu and Pierre Gasly.
