“I had to risk it all” - Max Verstappen reacts on gaining his first-ever Monaco GP pole | F1 2023

Max Verstappen pulled an unbelievable pole for the F1 Monaco Grand Prix of 2023. The defending champion was as pumped with adrenaline at the end of the session as his fans, according to his own tweet after the session.

The world championship leader was down by a couple of tenths during his final flying lap to Fernando Alonso, who was then on provisional pole with a lap time of 1:11.449. This was thought to be the pole position since Verstappen was two-tenths down after the end of the second sector.

However, his third sector was extremely strong. Much to the disbelief of every person watching the session, he went on to grab the pole, gaining enough in the final sector to set 1:11.365. His Tweet read:

"Pole in Monaco!!! I had to risk it all, but it all came together in that final sector."

"Very happy to have had such a great Saturday and to be on pole here for the first time. Thanks,@redbullracing"

This amazing lap gave Max Verstappen his first-ever pole start in Monaco. The track is very hard to overtake. With the performance he has shown in the season until now, it is quite possible that he might end up winning the race if he has the right strategy. He won in the principality once in 2021.

With Fernando Alonso starting right behind him, he will have to defend quite a bit since the track is so slow (cars hardly reach their maximum pace). But owing to the fact that overtakes are so difficult, it might be on his side.

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Max Verstappen was unsure to compete with Ferrari earlier

Max Verstappen

Although Max Verstappen was amazingly fast during the qualifying session, he didn't have any momentum to carry from the earlier practice sessions this weekend. He had revealed, after the second free practice session, that Ferrari pretty much had the ability to 'edge' Red Bull out.

According to him, he was on the wrong setup for the track. Even though the Dutchman had the fastest lap of that session, he felt that he might not be able to chase the Scuderia.

"But compared to Ferrari especially, I think we were still a bit lacking on like general ride of the car, so how it handles the kerbs, the bumps, the drops in camber."

However, things took quite a turn after the qualifying session as Ferrari turned out to be only the third fastest of the session and Max Verstappen took pole.