Andrea Stella: Oscar deservedly took the sprint pole.

      Andrea Stella, the McLaren team principal, is of course pleased with today’s qualifying results in Spa, which determined the starting grid for Saturday’s sprint. Oscar Piastri will start tomorrow’s race from pole position, and Lando Norris from third.

      Andrea Stella: "Of course, Oscar drove a fantastic lap, extracting everything the car was capable of. After switching from Medium to soft tires, he significantly improved, so his session can be called almost perfect – except for the fact that his lap was deleted in the second part of qualifying.

      As a result, we had to worry during the pit stop, but he corrected everything on his second attempt and earned the sprint pole.

      After the Silverstone event, where Oscar was penalized for a rule infringement when the peloton was behind the safety car before the restart, we, as always, analyzed everything that happened then. The conclusion we reached is that we need to learn certain lessons, although we still have questions about the race director's work and the stewards.

      But we approached the situation very constructively, will work to improve, and continue moving forward. For the Spa weekend, we prepared a couple of updates, and I want to thank the entire team for that. We have a new floor and a new rear wing – the work on upgrading the car never stops. If we pause, we immediately fall behind.

      I believe the car has definitely become more efficient, and everything is going exactly as we planned. That’s exactly what we need. At the same time, we see that all our rivals are very competitive, including Max Verstappen, who is very fast. But for now, this is just qualifying for the sprint, and there is still a lot of work ahead. The weekend promises to be very exciting, and Lando is also ready to take advantage of any opportunities that may arise."