Lawson was somewhat fortunate to finish sixth, after a late yellow flag caused by Alpine’s Pierre Gasly ruined Verstappen’s final lap, and denied him a sixth-straight pole position at the Red Bull Ring.

The counter-argument to that, though, is that Lawson has been on the receiving end of qualifying misfortune more than once this year.

The Kiwi’s best lap of 1m 04.926s saw him sneak ahead of Verstappen by just 0.003s, as Lawson’s best qualifying result of the season.

As a result, McLaren’s Lando Norris becomes the first different driver to start first since Valtteri Bottas in 2020, after an immense best lap of 1m 03.971s, more than half-a-second ahead of Charles Leclerc in second.

World championship leader Oscar Piastri will start third, 0.583s off his McLaren teammate.

Lawson’s Q3 appearance was just his second of the year so far, coming after he started ninth in Monaco, which resulted in a career-best eighth-placed finish.

And while starting sixth is not Lawson’s best qualifying position, having started fifth in Brazil last year, this was by far his most impressive, given the former came on a wet track in drying conditions.

After a five-minute delay to the start of Q1, given a lengthy red flag following a crash in the preceding race in Formula Two, the 20 drivers were conservative in getting out on track.

The short nature of the Red Bull Ring – one of the shortest laps on the Formula One calendar – left drivers at real risk of being stuck in traffic.

That wasn’t helped by the track temperature being in the high 40s, and increasing tyre wear, even with Racing Bulls being one of three teams with an extra set of softs, saved from practice, along with Alpine and Aston Martin.

Lawson avoided the early traffic, and emerged with just over 12 minutes to go in Q1, and set a first lap of 1m 5.400s, to temporarily sit seventh. By the time all drivers had set a lap time, Lawson was 11th, and just 0.356s clear of the drop zone.

When Lawson returned for his second attempt in Q1, he was 13th and was 0.182s clear of 15th. But a lap of 1m 05.017s was ultimately good enough for third in the session, and second only to the two McLarens to beat the drop by 0.261s, at a time where Red Bull’s Yuki Tsunoda failed to advance, and missed out by 0.091s.

Into Q2, Lawson’s first time effort saw him jump to the top of the leaderboard, admittedly with only seven drivers having posted a lap, and with a slower time – 1m 05.248s – than he’d set in Q1.

That mark was ultimately knocked from top spot, but Lawson was still 0.822 clear of elimination at the time the 15 remaining drivers had set a time.

With just over five minutes left in Q2, a grass fire at turn 10 triggered a red flag, that effectively ended Williams’ Alex Albon’s day, as he had to abort a fast lap on a set of fresh tyres.

After the resumption, Lawson improved his best lap to 1m 05.041s, and was able to get into Q3 by just 0.087s in ninth place.

Making the most of a rare appearance in Q3, Lawson began on a set of used soft tyres – saving his fresher ones for later – but was unable to set a timed lap at the first time of asking.

With less than three minutes to go in Q3, Lawson was able to post a 1m 4.926s to move into sixth, one position off his best qualifying position, but will settle for being the best Red Bull-backed car when the lights go out.

Formula One’s Austrian Grand Prix begins at 1am on Monday (NZ time).

Austrian Grand Prix starting grid

Alex Powell is a sports journalist for the NZ Herald. He has been a sports journalist since 2016.