Verstappen at a loss to explain qualifying struggles

The Dutchman had high hopes of a decent starting slot at Silverstone after ending the final practice session fifth fastest, just one place ahead of Toro Rosso teammate Carlos Sainz.

But his efforts fell flat when he struggled with his car's handling and ended up 13th on the grid.

"I don't know. It's very strange," he said, when asked by Motorsport.com about what had happened. "I can't really give an explanation about what went wrong.

"I just had oversteer and a lot of traction problems compared to P3 and compared to the other practices. So something definitely was not right there.

"To lose half a second compared to P3 is very strange, as normally you improve. We really have to analyse what went wrong.

"The only thing we changed was the floor because we had a little bit of damage in P3. We have to check [if that was the reason]."

Sainz gave it all

In contrast to Verstappen's problems, Sainz felt he had achieved the maximum as he ended up eighth on the grid.

"Obviously you can say I should be a big surprised after P5/P6 in practice and expecting a bit more, but there was nothing more out there today," he said.

"I did two laps with exactly the same lap time

"Mercedes has something for qualifying and they do this, and teams like Force India and Williams from being behind in P3, they go in front.

"But to be one tenth off [Sebastian] Vettel is something big knowing the power deficit."