Photo: Macau Grand Prix<\/p><\/div>\n

George Russell<\/strong> snatched a shock pole position at the Macau Grand Prix at the end of the second qualifying session.<\/p>\n

The Briton was only 13th in Thursday’s first qualifying session, and in the same position in Friday morning practice, but became a frontrunner at the crucial moment.<\/p>\n

Sitting sixth during a couple of late red flags, the Macau rookie took top spot away from compatriot Callum Ilott<\/b> by 0.072 seconds with two minutes left on the clock, then went 0.37s clear on his subsequent?lap inside the final minute.<\/p>\n

His pole was secured seconds later by a red flag after Arjun Maini<\/strong>?found the barriers at Lisboa.<\/p>\n

“I went into this?weekend saying I would take?it easy, focus on Q2, but I was?much further down the order,” said Russell, driving for the Hitech Grand Prix team on its first Macau appearance.<\/p>\n

“So?I was getting a little bit worried, but we made some changes to the car and I was?confident with what we did. I did a really good lap after the last red flag and I got pole, and just managed to?pull probably one of the best laps of my life out.<\/p>\n

“I couldn?t have really ever imagined this after the sessions we had but what an awesome?result.”<\/p>\n

Ilott had been the star of the day until its?final moments. He was fastest by half a second in practice, and hit the top in qualifying after 15 of the alloted 40 minutes.<\/p>\n

He was still there come the first interruption with 10 minutes left on the clock as Japan’s?Daiki Sasiki<\/strong> crashed.<\/p>\n

The restart didn’t last long, with?Maximilian Gunther<\/strong> hitting the barriers hard in the final corner as headed onto a flying lap.<\/p>\n

After the final restart it was only Russell that really improved among the frontrunners as light rain began to fall, with Ilott retaining a place on the front row despite setting his time on old tyres.<\/p>\n

“When I went out I did the lap on completely old tyres so I was pretty happy with that time, it was a really good lap,” said Ilott.<\/p>\n

“Being at the rear of the pit lane it’s quite hard to get a lap, always trying to find space. I thought I?had two laps to come, but I only had one unfortunately.<\/p>\n

“Honestly I was so disappointed. My radio wasn?t working, so the last I knew I was P1, and with the rain I thought no-one?would beat it. To see him on pole it was a bit of a disappointment but I’m happy for him as I know him quite well and he?s done a good job.”<\/p>\n

Thursday pacesetter Antonio Felix da Costa?<\/b>took third, having gone quickest just before Ilott did.<\/p>\n

Sergio Sette Camara<\/strong> was fourth in front of?Kenta Yamashita<\/strong> and?Jake Hughes<\/strong>, who was showing the speed to join his fellow Englishmen at the front with a session-best sector one when the session was ended prematurely.<\/p>\n

Before his crash, Macau first-timer Gunther was showing?improved form and finished?up as the lead Prema driver seventh in front of struggling team-mate Felix Rosenqvist<\/b>.<\/p>\n

Lando Norris<\/strong> repeated his Thursday pace to top the times early on but was shuffled back to ninth, in front of the final Prema driver Cassidy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

George Russell snatched a shock pole position at the Macau Grand Prix at the end of the second qualifying session.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":35759,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2341,875],"tags":[580,1982,312],"class_list":["post-35758","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-macau-grand-prix","category-news","tag-george-russell","tag-hitech-gp","tag-macau-grand-prix"],"yoast_head":"\n