F1 – Abu Dhabi Grand Prix Qualifying – Live news and lap-by-lap updates as Carlos Sainz and Lewis Hamilton are OUT before final session, with Max Verstappen fastest so far

This is what it looks like when everyone has completed a lap.

Just over five minutes left.

The world champion comes through first and he has improved his time from Q2 by 0.3 seconds.

Norris is close behind him again, with Perez in third place so far.

Here we go… will Max Verstappen get twelve poles this season?

Russell knocks Hamilton out of qualifying as he takes him out of the top 10! Another big shock here.

Hamilton – five-time pole setter in Abu Dhabi – starts eleventh.

A disaster for the seven-time world champion.

Hamitlon and Russell are both out and in desperate need of a better time, with the pair currently in the elimination zone.

Alonso is also in danger while Verstappen is still clear in first place.

Carlos Sainz has just spoken after his surprise early exit from Sky Sports.

‘It was a very bad situation we found ourselves in, being the last car to leave the pits. Also the situation with the traffic in the first and second sectors, all the guys who had just completed their lap. I don’t think they got out of the way very gracefully, but it’s our fault. We had a problem with the front wing, which delayed us quite a bit. This has been a difficult weekend because this is not the pace we need… It will now be very difficult to secure P2 in the Constructors’ Championship. We have to figure out what we need to do to get decent points tomorrow.

Ricciardo, Gasly, Albon, Ocon and Hulkenberg are currently in the elimination zone, with the latter having a lap time scrapped.

Norris is currently second fastest, +0.180 seconds behind Verstappen.

Hamilton is flirting with the brink in 10th place and he looks set for a second run in Q2 soon.

Alex Albon is the first to set a time in Q2.

He set a time of 1:24.965, which is 0.7 seconds faster than Q1, but he is on used tires.

Interestingly, both Red Bulls are on new tires and Verstappen has remained 0.720 seconds clear

Verstappen on a new set of tires.

Wow! What a drama, Sainz can only set the 16th fastest time and he is OUT!

A torrid week for Sainz continues and Ferrari looks battered.

A few expletives can be heard on the team radio.

He suggests that people deliberately blocked and slowed him down in the pit area as he tried to get out for his lap.

Several drivers are at risk of crashing here, with Sainz and Piastri both currently in the danger zone.

Alonso has risen to eleventh place, Hamilton to eighth place and Russell is now fourth.

Piastri breathes a sigh of relief as he rises to eleventh place.

But Sainz is only 15th and he could be out!!

Sargeant had bounced back by jumping to fourth on the leaderboard.

But oh no! His time was canceled again after exceeding the track limits in the first corner.

It is almost certain that he will already be out of qualifying and he has been outpaced by Albon, his teammate, on every occasion this year.

Meanwhile, there is a small queue in the pit lane on the way out and Verstappen is not happy, which follows yesterday’s drama.

A decent lap time for the American, but it was removed due to exceeding the track limits in the first corner.

Together with Hulkenberg and Zhou, they pass the three drivers without time.

There is about a second between Verstappen in first place and Stroll in fourteenth.

However, Hamitlon came in at thirteenth place, while Russell is ninth.

A pretty disappointing start for the British…

No surprises Verstappen is currently leading, although it was not his best lap.

He set a time of 1:24.160, with Norris 0.208 seconds behind him and Leclerc slightly further back.

And we are on the road with cars on the track.

No one seems to be in a hurry to leave as there are still no cars on the track.

Maybe they are waiting for the best conditions.

As a reminder, this qualifying session lasts 18 minutes and has just been reduced to 14 minutes.

We are now just minutes away from the start of qualifying.

Lewis Hamliton has the most poles of any driver in Abu Dhabi with five?

Could he add something to that today? His recent form doesn’t suggest that, but what way would that be for the seven-time world champion to put an end to what happened?

When you hear a sound coming from the Mercedes hospitality area here in Abu Dhabi, it is the sound of stamping feet.

The team that once dominated the sport with serene efficiency is now in a state of collapse. The latest example of Toto Wolff’s thin skin came when he instructed his PR agent to ask me to leave their building ahead of Lewis Hamilton’s press conference.

It seems my main offense was questioning Wolff at the press conference in Las Vegas last week when training was postponed. Wolff denied the obvious embarrassment this brought to the sport’s all-new showpiece event.

Read this week’s full Pole Position column from Jonathan McEvoy below…

Max Verstappen reignited his rivalry with Mercedes by lashing out at the ‘slow’ Lewis Hamilton and George Russell after a bizarre collision in training in which the Red Bull driver tried to overtake both in the pit lane.

During practice at the Abu Dhabi circuit, an impatient Verstappen was seen weaving past rivals in the narrow pit lane.

While many were unimpressed by Verstappen’s antics, the Dutchman turned the spotlight on Hamilton and Russell, who he said were ‘foolish’ in their attempt to ‘push’ him against the wall.

Understandably, Max Verstappen has the most pole positions in 2023, which is no surprise as he has won 18 of the 21 races.

However, he has only actually started from pole eleven times, with Charles Leclerc in second place on the grid five times.

Sergio Perez and Carlos Sainz both have two poles, while Lewis Hamilton has one.

There may be a big Premier League match involving his former club, but Sergio Aguero is one of Abu Dhabi’s many celebrities.

The Manchester City icon wore a club-themed racing outfit as he walked through the racing paddock earlier today.

His old city number, 10, adorned his kit in a way that will bring back many memories for the club’s fans.

The big drama in F1 this week was about the future of Lewis Hamilton.

Red Bull chief Christian Horner claimed in an exclusive interview with Mail Sport that a representative of the seven-time world champions approached his team about a possible move.

Hamilton denied this and labeled Horner a ‘lone stirrer’ as they exchanged a war of words.

It seems like only yesterday that the 2023 F1 season kicked off in Bahrain, but here we are with the final race of the year in Abu Dhabi.

It’s been one-way traffic for pretty much the entire season, with Red Bull winning all but one of the 21 races so far.

Eighteen of these went to Max Verstappen, with the Dutchman taking his third world title in Qatar last month.

They have also wrapped up the Constructors’ Championship, with a whopping 822 points, but second place is still up for grabs as Mercedes are just four points ahead of Ferrari with 392 and 388 respectively.

And welcome to Mail Sport’s live blog of Abu Dhabi Grand Prix qualifying.

Make sure to stay with us in the coming hours for all the action and updates as we find out who will start on pole for the final race of the 2023 season.