Sainz stunned by first F1 pole as lap "nothing special"

Carlos Sainz was left stunned after taking pole position for the British Grand Prix after a lap the Ferrari driver described as "nothing special".

Max Verstappen had been the man to beat all the way up to Q3 but a messy final 12 minutes for the current world championship leader opened the door for Sainz.

The Spaniard seized the opportunity to take his maiden F1 pole with a one-minute, 40.983secs - edging out the Red Bull driver by just 0.072s.

"It was a good lap but I was struggling a lot with the standing water on the intermediate," explained Sainz.

"There was a lot more standing water on the racing line and it was very easy to get snaps and lose the lap. Also, it was more difficult to get temperature into the intermediates in these conditions.

"In the end, I put together a lap that I thought was nothing special but I just put it on the board and it was pole position which came as a bit of a surprise."

Silverstone marks Sainz's 150th grand prix start and asked if he can convert pole into a first race victory, he replied: "I think so.

"The pace has been there all weekend except for FP3 where we had some issues that we think we have corrected for quali.

"But if I base myself on my FP2 pace, then we should be in a good position to hold on to it.

"I'm sure Max and Charles [Leclerc] will put a lot of pressure on but I will try my best of course."

Leclerc 'didn't deserve pole'

Leclerc was on course to snatch pole position away from his Ferrari team-mate but a spin during his final Q3 effort put an end to his charge.

Asked if he was disappointed to miss out on the top spot, Leclerc conceded: "Yeah I am, but I'm happy for Carlos. He did a great job today.

"I spun on that last lap. I knew it was the lap where I had to put everything together as a driver but I didn't, so I don't deserve to be on pole but P3 is still a good position to start for tomorrow's race.

"Hopefully, putting everything together we can come back."

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