Andrea Kimi Antonelli secured his sixth pole position of the season at the 2026 Formula 1 Belgian Grand Prix with the fastest lap time of 1:44.361. The Mercedes driver finished 0.317 seconds ahead of Max Verstappen, continuing his team's tradition of consecutive pole positions.
Verstappen, using the wind shade provided by his teammate Isack Hadjar, who was already starting from the back of the grid due to power unit changes, temporarily took the lead on the second lap. Seeing this move by Verstappen, Antonelli pulled ahead of his rival by three seconds on his final lap, recording a time of 1:44.361; no other driver came close to this time.
Norris is third, but starts the race from 13th place.
Lando Norris, who finished Antonelli's first lap by a mere 0.039 seconds in the first run, recorded the third best time in the opening lap of Q3. On his second lap, Norris went off the rails at Turn 13, hitting the gravel and failing to complete his lap; he narrowly avoided the fate of Pierre Gasly and Lewis Hamilton, who had similar incidents during practice sessions. However, due to a 10-place penalty stemming from component changes to his power unit, Norris will start Sunday's race from 13th position.
Charles Leclerc also put in a remarkable lap in the early runs, finishing only a few hundredths of a second behind the leaders. George Russell, who was fourth in Q3, moved up to third thanks to Norris's penalty; Leclerc finished fourth. Based on this, Russell and Leclerc share second place.
Hamilton and Piastri move up to fifth place.
Despite crashing at Turn 13 at the end of Q3, Lewis Hamilton finished qualifying in sixth place, moving up to fifth in the race. Oscar Piastri overtook Arvid Lindblad in the final moments to take seventh, while Lindblad impressed to finish eighth. Gabriel Bortoleto was ninth. Hadjar didn't attempt a lap in Q3, knowing he would be starting from the back of the grid this weekend.
In Q2, Liam Lawson made progress on his second lap; however, he finished just 0.040 seconds behind Gabriel Bortoleto, failing to make the top 10. Lawson was unable to use Racing Bulls' updated car this weekend, as the team only had one set of parts available, which was allocated to Lindblad.
In the qualifying zone of Q2, Carlos Sainz and Oliver Bearman were separated by only 0.002 seconds. In Q1, both Alpine drivers made progress in their final laps; Franco Colapinto, despite being in qualifying zone after the first runs, overtook Alex Albon by 0.007 seconds on the final lap. Esteban Ocon was eliminated in 18th place, unable to benefit from drag. Valtteri Bottas was the fastest Cadillac, just 0.022 seconds behind Ocon, and overtook Sergio Perez on the second lap. Fernando Alonso will start from the back of the grid in any case due to power unit changes.