And welcome to our coverage for Sprint Saturday, to give it its unofficial title, for this weekend’s Belgian Grand Prix. This is the third weekend of six sprint weekends in 2023, which means the format is slightly different and indeed different from last year’s format. In short it’s qualifying for the main race on Friday (already done) and then qualifying for the sprint race this morning and then the actual sprint race itself later this afternoon. 

Yesterday was a fairly interesting couple of sessions, first practice and qualifying both being affected by the rain which is around the track all weekend. In the end, though, it was the man who has won the last seven grands prix who topped qualifying by a fairly enormous margin. Who would have though that?

Charles Leclerc, who often goes well at this track, put in a decent performance for Ferrari. He was 0.8sec down on Verstappen but will actually start from pole position on Sunday as the Dutchman takes a grid penalty of five places. Sergio Perez was third with Lewis Hamilton fourth and Carlos Sainz fifth. Oscar Piastri continued his good form in out-qualifying his team-mate Lando Norris, but the other Australian on the grid, Daniel Ricciardo, was eliminated in Q1 and will start 19th. 

Should we expect more of the same from the sprint qualifying and race today? Well, probably, yes, but it all depends on the conditions. Spa is a little trickier in the wet than other tracks because of the high speeds, inclines and declines as well as the fact that the track is so large. It can easily be bone dry on one part of the track and soaking on another. 

In any case, we will find out and some rain will keep things interesting. Won’t it? Fingers crossed for that, in all honesty.