Bottas edged his way to Pole by 0.007 second from Hamilton as Verstappen’s Red Bull struggled in the windy Portimao conditions. 

In what will come as a much needed confidence boost for the under pressure Bottas, he snatched pole away from his Mercedes teammate with an outstanding lap. Hamilton will be frustrated to miss out on his 100th pole position by such a fine margin. The Britain had looked a class apart in Qualifying 2 as he went nearly half a second faster then his teammate but as conditions changed in Qualifying 3 the Finn edged it. 

Verstappen had a tough time in the Red Bull, with the windy conditions appearing to hurt the rear end performance. Both him and his teammate had unstable moments at turn 4, with Verstappen being forced to go over track limits and have his lap time deleted, a lap that would have put him on pole. 

The other standout performers of the day were Ocon, who secured sixth in an up turn of fortunes for an Alpine team that has disappointed so far. Norris who secured 7th and was second fastest in Q2 whilst his teammate Ricciardo was shockingly knocked out in Q1 and starts 16th. Vettel who overcame his struggles from the previous two weekends to outperform his car to 10th. Finally Russell who dragged his back marker car to p11 and starts in his highest position in a Williams.

Full results:

1. Bottas

2. Hamilton

3. Verstappen

4. Perez

5. Sainz

6. Ocon 

7. Norris

8. Leclerc

9. Gasly

10. Vettel

11. Russell

12. Giovinazzi

13. Alonso

14. Tsunoda 

15.Raikkonen

16.Ricciardo

17. Stroll

18. Latifi

19. Schumacher 

20. Mazepin

image credits: Aston Martin Cognizant F1 Team, Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 team, Red Bull Racing Honda