MADRID — Lando Norris produced a “masterpiece” on Saturday as he claimed pole position for McLaren with a stunning lap to beat championship leader Kimi Antonelli of Mercedes in a tense qualifying session for the Spanish Grand Prix.

World champion Norris, who had missed most of second practice on Friday due to an enforced gearbox change, topped the times in one minute and 31.824 seconds to beat the 20-year-old Italian by just 0.011 seconds

Max Verstappen of Red Bull was third, 0.140 seconds adrift, ahead of Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc with George Russell sixth in the second Mercedes at the new ultra-demanding, high-risk hybrid Madring circuit.

“It was a masterpiece and one of the best laps of his life,” said McLaren team chief Andrea Stella after seeing Norris defy the odds on a track he had described as “like Monaco on steroids”.

Norris said: “I’m shocked and bit surprised, but my God it was probably one of the best laps I have ever done in my career so I’m very, very happy, very proud and very happy for the team.

“It was one of those laps where everything came together. I had a good idea of what I wanted to do, but it was whether my brain would let me do it on the last lap and everything worked perfectly.

“The adrenaline was high on the last lap. It is just one where you have got to relax, just let it all flow. It is so easy to get tense around here — there’s a lot of walls that come out at you pretty quickly!