The Qatar Grand Prix schedule continued with sprint qualifying, where there weren't many new developments: Lando Norris took pole in sprint qualifying!
In SQ1, at the end of the first qualifying laps, Lando Norris and George Russell, followed by the Scuderia Ferrari duo, swapped positions at the top. After the final fast laps of the stage, Norris maintained his advantage, closing in on the lead, while those eliminated—in the case of the first name, we can now say without a doubt that it was no surprise—were Sergio Pérez, Yuki Tsunoda, Esteban Ocon, Guanyu Zhou, and Franco Colapinto.
After the first few attempts in SQ2, the previous trend continued, with McLaren very close behind. The difference was that now Oscar Piastri was leading, just ahead of Leclerc and Norris. Ultimately, this dominant position continued, with only George Russell able to interfere, forming the Norris-Russell-Piastri trio. However, Liam Lawson, Fernando Alonso, Alexander Albon, Valtteri Bottas, and Lance Stroll were left out, allowing them to begin preparing for Saturday's main event.
In SQ3, there were no longer many unanswered questions: Lando Norris and McLaren completed this leg of the weekend quickly, easily securing pole position ahead of George Russell and Oscar Piastri.
