The biggest surprise arguably came in Q1 when Lewis Hamilton was knocked out of qualifying, the stewards deleting his lap time due to a track limit infringement. The Ferrari driver starts 16th in Sunday’s race — his worst qualifying result of the season.

Lewis Hamilton’s Belgian GP weekend got off to the worst possible start as the seven-time World Champion suffered a shock elimination in SQ1 for the Sprint event. It marked the first time since the introduction of the Sprint format that a Ferrari driver had failed to progress past the opening session — an unwanted record Hamilton certainly did not expect to own.

Lewis Hamilton lamented an “unacceptable” error in qualifying at the Belgian Grand Prix on Saturday as Lando Norris turned the tables on teammate Oscar Piastri to take pole position.