Winners and losers from the 2024 Brazilian Grand Prix sprint qualifying

It’s time for your winners and losers after qualifying for the Brazilian Grand Prix sprint race.

Shortened sessions and the threat of rain meant it was a more challenging time for the strategists and drivers as they looked to start as high up the grid for Saturday as possible.

Winners and losers from the 2024 Brazilian Grand Prix sprint qualifying

Winners

Oscar Piastri and McLaren

What a lap and what a performance from the whole team. After Lando Norris had dominated the qualifying session, Piastri pulled an almighty time out of his hat to secure the McLaren one-two with him at the front.

Having lost some of the title momentum to Ferrari in recent weeks, McLaren would have been looking for a positive weekend in Brazil and there is every indication so far that it will be.

Team orders will again be the question of the day in the sprint but Piastri’s lap alone means he deserves a shot at the sprint victory.

Oliver Bearman

Oliver Bearman is proving to be rather good at this super sub role. After another late notice call, Bearman not only made it out of SQ1 but was part of the fastest 10 when his far more experienced team-mate failed to be.

There will be some frustration from the 19-year-old as a mistake early in sector one meant he never set a flying lap but had he done that, he could have been starting even higher up.

Valtteri Bottas

Don’t quote us on this but we reckon this is the first time all season Valtteri Bottas has been anywhere near a winners’ column.

In his defence, he has not had the car to do much this year and the fact that Zhou Gunayu was two seconds slower in SQ1 suggests that Bottas is finding speed against the odds but credit where credit is due, it was excellent work to get into SQ2.

Will that continue into the race? Probably not but it is at least some kind of positive for what has been a miserable year for Bottas.

Pierre Gasly

The 10 places separating Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon was the joint biggest gap of any team-mates in qualifying and further signs that the former is finding pace where Ocon is not.

The triple header has been Gasly’s best run of the season so far and starting P7 in the shortened race, there will be confidence he can stay in the points.

Losers

Aston Martin

What on earth has happened to Aston Martin? A double elimination in SQ1 compounds what has been a miserable run of form and it is not as if you can even say they have qualified too far out of position.

The lack of speed in the car makes the sprint a write-off but they need to find something, anything, to improve in qualifying or else it will be a very miserable weekend indeed.

Sergio Perez

Whether it was Sergio Perez or the Red Bull pitwall that meant he failed to reach the line is of little consequence given he was therefore unable to do a final flying run.

It is a very predictable outcome, so much so that we even debated whether it was worth putting him in the losers’ column, but even with a different chassis, failing to make SQ3 ahead of a Haas and Alpine is unacceptable.

Whatever credit Perez has left at Red Bull is being eaten away with every passing session.

More from sprint qualifying in Sao Paulo

Oscar Piastri stuns Lando Norris for Sprint qualifying pole

Lando Norris snaps back at ‘questions I hate’ after Max Verstappen battle raised

Esteban Ocon

Esteban Ocon’s time at Alpine is ending with him in the dust of his much quicker team-mate. His failure to qualify ahead of Gasly was the third time in a row but it is not just that Gasly is ahead but it is that he is so far ahead.

For whatever reason, Gasly has unlocked some more performance in the A524 and is making Alpine’s end of the season less miserable than the start of it suggested it could be.

On Thursday, Ocon said he cannot wait to drive the Haas and with performances like this, we can see why.

Yuki Tsunoda

At a time when there is a lot of focus on who will be in the Red Bull next year, Yuki Tsunoda did not want to be making an earlier exit from quali.

He told his engineer he did the best he could but there was just no grip but P18 speaks far louder than any of his words.

Read next: All the action as it happened from sprint qualifying for the Brazilian Grand Prix