SINGAPORE: George Russell put Mercedes on pole position for the Singapore Grand Prix on Saturday with Red Bull’s Max Verstappen taking the second spot on the front row and complaining of being obstructed as he tried to chase down the Englishman.

Russell crashed in practice on Friday but drove brilliantly around the Marina Bay track in the final round of qualifying to put in two laps worthy of pole, his best timed at one minute 29.158 seconds.

“Amazing to be on pole position,” said Russell. “Yesterday was a very challenging day for many different reasons, but it’s good to come back and get a good result today. Of course, there’s a long, sweaty race tomorrow.”

Dutchman Verstappen, who won the last two rounds of the championship from pole, was 0.182 seconds back but disgruntled after being blocked by the McLaren of Lando Norris and making a mistake on his final flying lap.

“That’s what happens when there’s a car in front of you, just cruising two seconds in front,” said the four-times world champion.

“I think it’s quite clear that that’s not nice when it happens. It could have been avoided.”

Championship leader Oscar Piastri, who leads Verstappen by 69 points in the drivers’ standings, will start on the second row after clocking the third fastest time.

“Obviously, I would have wanted more, but I don’t think we had four tenths in it to go and get pole,” said the Australian.

“It was a pretty clean session so that’s all I can ask for.”

Kimi Antonelli will start in the other Mercedes on the second row of the grid alongside Piastri, whose teammate Norris was fifth fastest and will line up in row three with Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton.

McLaren need 13 points from their two drivers in Sunday’s race to clinch a second consecutive constructors’ championship title.