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Another eventful qualifying session in the 2022 F1 season saw severe rainfall, five red flags, and a myriad of emotions. Max Verstappen bagged his 75th pole position for Red Bull at the Imola GP qualifying, while his team-mate Sergio Perez had a rather underwhelming Friday with a seventh-place finish. This sets the grid for Saturday's sprint, which will in turn set the final grid for the main race on Sunday.
Despite going on a sensational lap a day after announcing an exciting two-year contract extension with Ferrari, Carlos Sainz spun into the gravel and hit the wall in Q2. The Spaniard will hence be starting the sprint race on Saturday from tenth.
The Spaniard's incident brought out the red flag and did not allow enough time for the rest of the drivers to improve their times set on soft tires before the incident. The restart saw a significantly wetter track due to the increased rainfall, leaving the existing bottom five in Q2 at a bigger risk of being eliminated. Both Mercedes cars failed to reach Q3 for the first time since the 2012 Japanese Grand Prix, correspondingly ending an impressive streak of 187 consecutive Q3 appearances.
Just a few minutes into the qualifying session, the rear right-hand corner of Alex Albon's Williams caught on fire as the brakes simply exploded. The flaming debris brought the session to an abrupt end, while his teammate Nicholas Latifi qualified eighteenth.
Kevin Magnessun matched his best qualifying finish in F1 with a fourth-place finish, while both McLarens had a decent session, given their struggles so far this season. Aston Martin made their first Q3 appearance in 2022 with a ninth-place finish for Sebastian Vettel.
The session was interrupted time and again with several spins and collisions. McLaren, Aston Martin, and Haas had a particularly good Friday, while it will be a day to forget for the likes of Mercedes and AlphaTauri.
Here are some of the best fan reactions to the 2022 F1 Imola Qualifying
