The New Zealander was comfortably through Q1 but saw his final attempt in Q2 unravel early in the lap, ending a qualifying session that team engineers believed had the potential for both cars to reach the top 10.
“We have a very fast car but unfortunately got hit by a big gust of wind at the start of the lap and from that point you’re trying to make up lap time,” Lawson explained.
“We’re all dealing with it at different points throughout qualifying, but it obviously cost us today.
“We have a good package, so we’ll be working hard to make something work to get into the points tomorrow.”
It marks Lawson’s fifth time outqualifying teammate Isack Hadjar in 2025, after the Frenchman crashed heavily in Turn 6 on his opening Q1 run.
Hadjar was unhurt but did not set a time, ending the session 20th and last.
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He will start from 19th after Lance Stroll’s grid penalty from the Sprint race drops the Canadian to the back.
Racing Bulls head of vehicle performance Guillaume Dezoteux said the team had been confident of a strong showing before errors and deleted laps halted their progress.
“Liam had a strong Q1 and went through comfortably but during his last lap of Q2, he made a mistake in Turn 1 and lost some time,” Dezoteux said.
“Unfortunately the lap was then deleted for track limits going wide into Turn 19.
“It’s disappointing as we were hoping both cars to fight for top 10 with the six sets of soft tyres we had kept for this session, but we’ll look forward to tomorrow and hopefully turn it around.”
Hadjar apologised to the team after his early exit, admitting he misjudged his approach into the corner.
“I arrived at the corner with too much speed and I was definitely surprised by how suddenly the car snapped, but I knew I couldn’t catch it,” he said.
“The car is quick, but obviously starting from the back isn’t ideal. We’ve had good races coming from the back before, but it’ll be a challenge.”
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