Carlos Sainz was surprised to claim pole position for the British Grand Prix after feeling that his lap was "nothing special". The Ferrari driver will start from P1 on the grid for the first time in his F1 career following Saturday's qualifying, during which he navigated the wet conditions to set the quickest time. After sealing pole, Sainz voiced his disbelief over the team radio when he said: "No way! I didn't expect that one." His engineer then replied: "You keep it together, like a smooth operator!"
The lap was "nothing special", says Sainz
Following the session, Sainz thanked the fans at Silverstone for their support, but acknowledged that his result came as quite a shock. "Thank you for the whole crowd for cheering, and thanks everyone for staying out there with this rain," Sainz told Sky Sports F1 . "Spaniards, we struggle a bit more with this rain, but you can tell that you guys are used to it, so thanks for being there! "It was a good lap, but I was struggling a lot with the standing water on the Intermediate [tyres]. There was a lot more standing water in the racing line, and it was very easy to get snaps and lose the lap. "[It was] also more difficult to get temperature into [these] Intermediates with these conditions. "In the end I put together a lap, that I thought was nothing special, but just put it on the board and see how it is, and it was pole position which came as a bit of a surprise."
Sainz confident of race pace
When asked whether he could clinch a debut Formula 1 victory in Sunday's race, Sainz explained: "I think so, yeah. "The pace has been there all weekend, except for FP3 [where] we had some issues that we [thought] we had corrected for qualy, but if I base myself on my FP2 pace, then we should be in a good position to try and hold on to it." Despite this, Sainz remains wary of the challenge posed by Max Verstappen – who will start alongside him on the front row – as well as teammate Charles Leclerc in third. "I'm sure Max and Charles will put a lot of pressure [on], but I will try my best of course," he added.
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