Verstappen on pole as threatening storm brings early end to qualifying

Max Verstappen took pole for the São Paulo Grand Prix as a threatening weather system brought an early halt to qualifying.

The Dutchman set a benchmark of a 1:10.727 to finish 0.294secs ahead of Ferrari's Charles Leclerc, with Lance Stroll just 0.043s ahead of teammate Fernando Alonso.

With the sky blackening, the top 10 rushed to set a lap early in Q3, with Verstappen at the front of the pack.

Lewis Hamilton was fifth fastest, leading the two Mercedes cars with George Russell sixth - seven and eight tenths down on Verstappen respectively.

Lando Norris was seventh ahead of Carlos Sainz, whilst Sergio Perez was halted by yellow flags as Oscar Piastri went off at Junção, before the session was red-flagged with no resumption possible.

The weather hit midway through the only laps of the session, though it appeared high winds were causing havoc with the drivers, with the rain only arriving later on.

Haas heroics not replicated

Haas took pole position a year ago through Kevin Magnussen but neither the Dane nor teammate Nico Hulkenberg could make Q3.

German Hulkenberg was 0.172s down on the top 10, finishing marginally faster than Alpine's Esteban Ocon, who failed to improve sufficiently on his final effort.

Ocon's teammate Pierre Gasly will line up 13th on Sunday ahead of Magnussen, who felt he was impeded by Leclerc on his last lap, whilst Williams' Alex Albon had his best lap deleted for a track limits infringement at Turn 4 and will therefore start 15th.

Ricciardo out in double AlphaTauri blow

AlphaTauri was desperately unlucky to see both drivers fall at the first hurdle, with Yuki Tsunoda and Daniel Ricciardo both within 0.05s of Gasly's cut-off effort of a 1:10.793.

The duo were half a second down on Russell's best effort of the session, marking the closest margin between first and 17th in Q1 history.

Japanese driver Tsunoda was aggrieved on his cooldown lap, suggesting he had been impeded during his best effort.

Ricciardo will be joined on the penultimate row of the grid by Alfa Romeo driver Valtteri Bottas, whose teammate Zhou Guanyu will start last, alongside Williams' Logan Sargeant.