Lando Norris secures sprint qualifying pole in Miami

Lando Norris put his McLaren on pole position for the Sprint race in Miami, marking the first non-Mercedes pole of the 2026 season. Norris found form quickly on the Miami circuit, despite a difficult FP1 session hampered by traffic. After a less ideal SQ2, he delivered a strong performance in SQ3 to secure the top spot by over two tenths.

Oscar Piastri qualified third for McLaren, narrowly missing out on second place by 0.017 seconds to Mercedes driver Kimi Antonelli. Piastri noted the encouraging potential of the new package brought by McLaren, while acknowledging the strong showings from Ferrari.

Mercedes faced challenges, with Antonelli securing second despite power unit issues in practice. George Russell qualified sixth, admitting the track and his driving style are not an ideal match. Ferrari's Charles Leclerc qualified fourth, feeling tyre performance was a limitation, while Lewis Hamilton was seventh after a shifting problem in SQ3.

Alpine achieved a strong result by getting both Pierre Gasly and Franco Colapinto into the top 10 shootout, with Colapinto qualifying eighth and Gasly tenth. Audi showed promising signs with their upgrade package, but neither driver reached the top 10 shootout, with Gabriel Bortoleto narrowly missing out in eleventh.