Russell snatches 'mighty' pole from Verstappen

Canadian Grand Prix

Venue: Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, Montreal Date: 15 June Race start: 19:00 BST on Sunday

Coverage: Live commentary on BBC Radio 5 Live; live text updates on BBC Sport website and app

Mercedes' George Russell snatched pole position for the Canadian Grand Prix from Red Bull's Max Verstappen.

Russell beat Verstappen by 0.160 seconds to grab the fastest time just seconds after the Dutchman himself had taken it away from McLaren's Oscar Piastri.

The Australian's team-mate and title rival Lando Norris could manage only seventh place, behind Mercedes' Kimi Antonelli, Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton and a superb performance from Fernando Alonso in the Aston Martin.

The grid sets up a battle into the first corner between Briton Russell and Verstappen just a race after their controversial conflict at the Spanish Grand Prix.

Verstappen was penalised 10 seconds and given three licence penalty points for deliberately colliding with Russell in the closing stages of the race and is one licence point away from a race ban.

Russell good-humouredly referenced this in his post-qualifying interview, when he said: "We're mates, so it's all good. I have a few more points on my licence to play with so let's see."

Russell had felt on arriving at the track on Saturday morning that he had a good chance of setting pole, and his confidence was well placed.

Like Verstappen using the medium tyre for his final lap, Russell said it was "one of the most exhilarating laps of my life".

He added: "I swear, every corner I was looking at my lap-time delta on my steering wheel and I was going 0.1secs quicker, 0.1secs quicker. I got to the last corner and I was 0.6secs up and I thought: 'This lap's mighty.' I am so pleased with pole."

Verstappen said: "I felt quite good all weekend. The car was in a good window. This track is quite cool. It feels like a big go-kart on the kerbs.

"You need to be quite efficient on the straights, which I think we are. The tough choice was the tyres and I think we chose the right ones. We will see what we can do tomorrow. I am already happy to be on the front row and I hope we can have a solid race."

McLaren had had a difficult weekend and Piastri said he had been "pretty happy with third".

The grid gives the Australian a good chance to extend his championship lead over Norris, who had a tricky session.

He missed the final chicane on his first lap of the top 10 shootout and had to be reminded not to push too much in the braking zones.

His second attempt was slower than Alonso's first and Norris failed to improve on his final run, and was bumped further down by Russell, Antonelli and Hamilton.