Russell takes pole for 2026 Azerbaijan Grand Prix in Baku

George Russell will start the 2026 Azerbaijan Grand Prix from pole position after lapping Baku in 1:42.526, more than eight tenths clear of the field. It is the 12th pole of the Mercedes driver’s Formula 1 career. Team-mate Kimi Antonelli will line up 16th after brushing the wall at Turn 1 in Q1 and ending his session early.

George Russell claimed pole position for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix in Baku with a lap of 1:42.526, the twelfth pole of his Formula 1 career. Charles Leclerc qualified second and Oscar Piastri third, completing the top three on the grid for Saturday’s race.

A qualifying session led from start to finish

Mercedes arrived at qualifying with momentum from the morning. Final practice was given over to low-fuel running and last preparations, with Russell third-fastest — second in the session — and Antonelli fourth as the team continued to evaluate tyre behaviour around the street circuit.

Russell then topped both Q1 and Q2, carrying the pace advantage he had shown all weekend into the decisive segment. In Q3 he set the benchmark with a margin of more than eight tenths of a second over Leclerc, an unusually large gap for a track where the field is normally covered by a few tenths.

“That lap was fantastic. Given how close it has been all weekend, I was shocked when I saw the gap. The lap felt incredibly good, but I definitely wasn’t expecting this result,” Russell said.

The driver explained that the plan had always been to stay on the same set of tyres, treating the first run as a safety lap before pushing to the limit on the second. “Everything came together perfectly. The car sat really well on the track and I was able to extract the maximum,” he said. With Max Verstappen, both Ferrari drivers and his own team-mate strong this weekend, Russell pointed to the start and a clean race as the priorities.

Antonelli out early after Turn 1 contact

Antonelli’s session ended in Q1 when he clipped the wall at Turn 1. He said the car had more grip on turn-in than he expected, after a change in wind direction and track conditions compared with his previous lap. He tried to bring the car back to the pits, but the damage was too great and race control instructed him to stop.

“It’s a shame, because I felt we had enough pace to get through comfortably and fight further forward,” he said, adding that the team made the right call in stopping the car. Starting from 16th on a circuit where overtaking is difficult will make recovery harder, though he said his focus is on making up ground and scoring points.

How Mercedes played it

Trackside Engineering Director Andrew Shovlin said the team approached qualifying “like a wet session”, aiming to stay on track continuously rather than depend on yellow flags — including being the first car out in Q3 and the first to finish the session.

He was more cautious about the race itself. In Baku, he said, the slipstream and the energy management demanded by these cars make it difficult to control a race from the front, so there will be a lot to manage over the full distance. On Antonelli, Shovlin said the team will repair and prepare the car, and expects him to make progress from the back half of the grid.

A further team comment in the release struck a similar note: the car has been competitive since the first practice session, which gives Mercedes a strong opportunity, but converting it in Baku will not be straightforward given the risk of incidents and the threats behind.

What it means

A pole by more than eight tenths at a circuit as narrow and unforgiving as Baku is a significant marker of single-lap pace, but track position is only part of the equation here. Safety cars are a recurring feature of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, and the long run to Turn 1 makes the getaway and the first slipstream battle decisive. With Leclerc and Piastri directly behind and Antonelli starting deep in the field, Mercedes has both an opportunity and a recovery job on its hands.