What the teams said – Sprint Qualifying in Miami

Formula 1’s official Miami Sprint Qualifying roundup focused on the teams’ first read on a competitive Friday that ended with Lando Norris on pole.

Norris took Sprint pole with a lap of 1:27.869s, beating Kimi Antonelli by 0.222s and putting Oscar Piastri third. Formula 1 said it was McLaren’s first P1 grid slot of the 2026 season and the first non-Mercedes pole of the year.

McLaren said its first phase of development upgrades showed promising signs. The team described the package as working as intended and said Norris’s result was a strong start to the weekend.

Mercedes was pleased to have Antonelli on the front row but said the session was messy. The team said it now needs to improve for Grand Prix qualifying and Sunday’s race.

Williams took a more incremental view of its Friday. It said both cars progressed through SQ1 and finished SQ2 in P14 and P15 while the team gathered useful data from its updated FW48 package.

The Miami session also left the bigger weekend picture open. McLaren will want to see whether the upgrade pace holds, while Mercedes will try to recover from setup and tyre-preparation issues before the next sessions.

The result gave Miami’s Sprint weekend an early storyline: McLaren looks more competitive, Mercedes has work to do, and the rest of the grid is still trying to turn Friday data into results.