F1 Live: 2024 Qatar Grand Prix qualifying

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Big improvement from Magnussen for sixth, Zhou narrowly misses Q3, Bottas goes 12th behind him.

Norris gets down to a 1’20.983 which puts him top of the times. Verstappen now second. Perez sixth, having a much better qualifying session than yesterday.

Sainz is being investigated for an unsafe release involving Hamilton.

Russell remarks the crosswind has picked up but it doesn’t stop him going quickest, by just a thousandth of a second.

Verstappen shows more pace in the Red Bull, he goes quickest by seven-hundredths of a second. Norris goes fourth so the Red Bull is quickest for now.

Q2 is go. Russell puts up a 1’21.161 as the benchmark, Sainz is three tenths of a second slower. Piastri pops into second ahead of the Ferrari.

Lawson says: “Alonso purposefully slowed up in nine and ten when he aborted his lap. That just sucks, man.” He race engineer Pierre Hamelin replies: “That was Stroll.”

Tsunoda narrowly escapes Q1 – but Lawson is out along with Albon. Hulkenberg also surprisingly failed to make the cut. Perez makes it comfortably through in eighth place.

Albon goes 15th, Colapinto stays 19th, Ocon stays last, so we know two drivers who are out.

Few improvements at the moment – Norris sets a better time but it gets deleted for track limits.

Vertappen improves to fourth on used soft tyres, Perez has joined the track on a new set as he falls to 12th.

Leclerc has improved to fourth, Perez still in the pits for now with four minutes remaining. Russell offering to give Hamilton a tow.

The times are close: Perez and Leclerc are only safe by two-tenths of a second, so we could see an elimination among the front-runners if they have trouble in the final runs.

Everyone has set a representative time now and the five drivers in the drop zone are Hulkenberg, Magnussen, Zhou, Colapinto and Ocon.

Perez has fallen to ninth. He says he ran out of battery energy at the end of his lap.

Sergio Perez, who was narrowly eliminated in the first round yesterday, moves up to seventh. No times from the Alpine drivers yet.

Russell moves to the top now with a 1’21.519, seven-tenths of a second quicker than team mate Lewis Hamilton who finished his lap a few seconds before him.

Magnussen immediately loses his first lap time with a track limits infringement. Lando Norris, surely the favourite for pole position, sets a 1’22.029, but Max Verstappen beats that by three tenths of a second.

The session is go. Russell, who sat at the pit lane exit for a minute and a half, leads the drivers out.

Drivers are queuing up at the end of the pits to join the track. Russell is first among them.

McLaren showed strong pace yesterday in qualifying for the sprint race and could have locked out the front row of the grid. George Russell managed to split the two MCL38s and he looked like their biggest threat in today’s sprint race.

Qualifying for the 2024 Qatar Grand Prix is coming up next.