Max Verstappen faces another catch-up race in the Belgian Grand Prix

Max Verstappen will start Sunday's Belgian Grand Prix from 11th on the grid. The world champion was the fastest in qualifying in the Red Bull but was demoted ten places due to a grid penalty for an engine change.

However, the Dutch Red Bull driver was satisfied with the car's performance during qualifying. "That was a nice qualifying. Luckily the weather was okay - it was raining a little bit, but at least we could do a decent qualifying," said Verstappen. Everything worked well, and we could do good lap times on every tyre set that we were on."

"So, yeah, very happy. The car was working quite well in the wet so I could just do my laps and try to do clean lap times in the wet which is always quite tricky. But tomorrow I know it's going to be quite a different day."

Charles Leclerc in the Ferrari leads the front row of the grid, alongside Verstappen's team-mate Sergio Pérez. Behind them are Lewis Hamilton in the Mercedes and Lando Norris in the McLaren. Verstappen has Pierre Gasly in the Alpine next to him on the sixth row of the grid. The race starts at 3 pm.

Verstappen won the Belgian Grand Prix in 2021, 2022, and 2023. Last year, he started from sixth place due to a grid penalty and won with a 22-second lead. The year before, he was unbeatable. Due to a grid penalty, Verstappen started from 14th place but took the lead after eighteen laps and finished first with a 17-second lead. The Dutch driver had previously indicated that it would be more difficult to win this year.

In the World Championship standings, Verstappen leads with 265 points. Norris is second with 189 points.