George Russell described making Q3 for the first time with Williams as “like a pole position” as the team breached the top 10 after a three-year absence.
Russell, who came close to the top 10 shootout at last weekend’s first Austria-based round, squeezed into Q3, doing so on the Medium compound tyre.
Equipped with Softs Russell was able to go on to qualify in ninth spot, ahead of Lance Stroll, and could profit further if Stroll’s Aston Martin team-mate Sebastian Vettel is penalised for impeding Fernando Alonso.
“It really felt like a pole position for us to get us into Q3,” he said. “It is one thing [to do it] but to do it on Mediums is massive.
“We were obviously debating prior to the session in which order we do Q2, whether it was Soft then Medium or vice versa, but we were pretty adamant we didn’t want to go into the top 10 on Soft.
“It almost feels like a pole position, and the most pumped up I’ve been since I last won a race probably.”
Russell reckons starting on the Medium compound should provide a substantial advantage in race trim, compared to surrounding rivals, who are due to use Softs.
“I mean if we did that last stint [in Q2] on Softs it would have been tricky as we didn’t want to be on that Soft,” he said.
“We’re in an amazing position with the AlphaTauri ahead of us on the Soft, Stroll and probably Seb behind us on the Soft too.
“We think that tyre is going to be disastrous in the race – seems like they know something we don’t, hopefully they don’t, but we’ve got flexibility with the strategy whereas those guys are pretty locked in.”
