F1 Austrian Grand Prix qualifying betting preview, tip and TV times

Practice three, Sky Sports F1, 11am Saturday
qualifying, Sky Sports F1, 2pm

An eventful practice day at the Red Bull Ring left a few questions going into qualifying for the Austrian Grand Prix.

Crashes for Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas brought out the red flags twice in the afternoon and disrupted drivers’ qualifying simulation runs, so this morning’s final practice should see plenty of track action.

The circuit is an unusual one, featuring only seven true corners, and championship leader Lewis Hamilton has an indifferent record there by his lofty standards.

Bottas has beaten the Briton to pole position in the Styrian mountains in each of the last two seasons, but it remains to be seen how much the Finn’s shunt has set him back.

Hamilton is odds-on to take his fourth pole of the season.

With laptimes of less than 65 seconds the field tends to be separated by small margins. It’s 11-10 that the pole position time is within 0.1 seconds of the second-fastest qualifying time, and that bet would have won the last two years.

With Ferrari looking stronger than they did in France last weekend it is likely to be similarly close this year.

The Italian team took some upgrades to Paul Ricard which didn’t work as anticipated, and were trying out some more new parts in practice in Austria.

Looking at Mercedes’ dominant form it is easy to forget that Sebastian Vettel took pole position just two races ago in Canada, and the German could be value to sneak on to the front row in Spielberg.

His young Ferrari teammate Charles Leclerc is quickly getting to grips with the demands of qualifying for a top team but he’s made plenty of mistakes along the way and Vettel looks much the more reliable of the two on a Saturday.

Carlos Sainz showed up well as McLaren followed up their strong performance in France, but the Spaniard will start the race from the back after an engine-change grid penalty, as will Toro Rosso’s Alex Albon.

Recommendation
S Vettel fastest qualifier
1pt each-way 13-2
bet365, Betway, RedZone
Yesterday’s practice one leading times: 1 L Hamilton 1:04.838, 2 S Vettel +0.144, 3 V Bottas +0.161, 4 C Leclerc +0.303, 5 M Verstappen +0.422, 6 P Gasly +0.540, 7 C Sainz +0.664, 8 D Ricciardo +1.008.
Practice two leading times: 1 C Leclerc 1:05.086, 2 V Bottas +0.331, 3 P Gasly +0.401, 4 L Hamilton +0.443, 5 C Sainz +0.459, 6 R Grosjean +0.615, 7 K Raikkonen +0.642, 8 S Vettel +0.785.

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