STRATEGY: Pirelli reveals what it expects from today's Saudi Arabian Grand Prix

Despite the softer compounds at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit compared to the previous season, Formula One's sole tyre manufacturer Pirelli has revealed that they expect drivers base their approach on a one-stop strategy.

Following on from Japan, Max Verstappen snatched pole away from what looked like being another dominant qualifying performance from McLaren in Saudi Arabia.

At the very last moment, the reigning champion pipped Oscar Piastri by just ten thousandths of a second with a time of 1m27.294s for the Dutchman against 1m27.304 for the Australian.

Mercedes George Russell came agonisingly close in battle for Jeddah pole, endup up third with a lap in 1’27”407, while sharing the third row with the Mercedes driver will be Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.

Commenting on the nail-biting qualifying session, Pirelli's motorsport director Mario Isola said: “What a qualifying session that was, especially Q3! In the final five minutes pole position changed hands five times, and as further proof of how close is this season there are four drivers from four different teams in the top four places.

Apart from the first edition of this race in 2021, when Lewis Hamilton was fasting in qualifying for Mercedes, Red Bull has always taken pole at this track, in 2022 and 2023 with Sergio Perez and now for the last two years with Verstappen. It was his 42nd career pole, the 105th for Red Bull Racing.

After the choice of compounds for the first four races of this season were the same as last year’s, Formula One's sole tyre manufacturer Pirelli elected to take a softer step for Jeddah, with the C3 as Hard, the C4 as Medium and the C5 as Soft being the trio available this weekend.

As for the tyre management on Saturday, all driver studiously avoided the Hard in the final practice, with just the Aston Martin and Racing Bulls drivers running their usual scrubbing in lap, the former also doing this with a set of Mediums.

Otherwise, red was the colour, with the sole exception of Gabriel Bortoleto, who used a set of Mediums to get used to the track, given that he had to miss FP2 yesterday because of a problem on his Sauber. All the other drivers used two sets each of the Soft.

When it comes to strategies, Pirelli thinks that the majority of drivers will be eager to pit only once at today's Saudi Arabian Grand Prix which is the reason why 15 drivers have saved two sets of Hards for the race based on the Friday's running.

Without too much degradation, the Milan-based company expects that a one-stop strategy will turn out the quickest way to complete the Jeddah race, with the order Medium-Hard being favourite, pitting between laps 14 and 20.

Isola continued: "There are a couple of reasons why many have opted to save two sets of this compound: firstly to be ready for any possible safety car situations, which have often been seen at this track and secondly, to have a backup in case there’s a significant step up in degradation tomorrow.

“Those starting from the back end of the grid might aim to make up positions by swapping the order of use of the compounds, (i.e. C4 then C3) pitting from lap 30. A two-stopper is not too far off in terms of total time taken, with a difference of around 5 seconds and would again involve using the C3 and C4.

"The C5 could be an option for drivers looking to make the most of its superior performance over the first few laps to make up places, or if there were to be a safety car in the closing stages of the race," concluded the Italian.