George Russell said "common sense prevailed" after his pole position lap at the Austrian Grand Prix was allowed to stand despite a yellow flag in the final sector.
The Mercedes driver secured pole by 0.236 seconds from Ferrari's Charles Leclerc despite lifting off the throttle on the approach to Turn 9 when yellow flags were shown for Max Verstappen's crashed Red Bull.
Yellow flags act as a warning to drivers to reduce their speed due to an incident, although double yellow flags are used for more serious incidents and, in qualifying, are an instruction for drivers to abort their lap.
As Russell approached the corner on his qualifying lap, only a single yellow flag was waving, which was why the stewards opted not to investigate the validity of his lap and allowed it to stand.
Double yellow flags were shown at the corner soon 15 seconds later, but by that point Russell was past the incident and completing his lap.
"It's a corner where you can see quite a lot, and I made this huge lift [off the throttle], and I was going to assess the situation as soon as I got to the corner, if the car was there, but as it was a single yellow and I was pretty confident there was no danger," Russell explained.
"As soon as I turned into the corner, I already saw the green flag up ahead, and I actually thought the car had continued, because I didn't see the car -- it was so far off the track -- but I didn't see the car whatsoever.
"It was only when I saw the green flag afterward, I saw it was, you know, well off into the wall. I was glad common sense prevailed there."
Had the race director immediately thrown a double yellow flag at the corner, Russell's lap would not have been allowed to stand -- but the Mercedes driver thinks the right decision was made to show a single.
"I think in that instance a single yellow was correct, because a double yellow is immediate danger," he added. "Lifting [off the throttle] 100 meters before a corner, or lifting off for a single yellow, you're never going to lose control of the car.
"The reason he [Verstappen] was in the wall that far away is because he was attacking and lost the car, so, you know, I think the single yellow was correct. I think I did everything right to be very much under control, and it's a very different story to a double."
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Russell's teammate Kimi Antonelli qualified fourth on the grid after he mistook the single yellow flag for a double and aborted his lap.
"It was unfortunate ... Realistically it was a mistake from my side because I thought I saw the [double] yellow instead it was a single so I completely aborted the lap when I could've just done a lift like George did," Antonelli said. "I think I was a tenth slower than George up to that point so it would still have been difficult to get pole, but at least front row was there."
The pole position was Russell's fourth of the year and his second in a row following the Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix.
In a season in which he has fallen 50 points behind Antonelli in the drivers' standings at the first seven races, he said everything clicked again in Austria.
"If I had the answer [to why the lap was so quick], we'd be at pole every week, to be honest," Russell said. "I said on Thursday, it's like when the car clicks, and the tires work, and it just gets into that sweet spot, a huge amount of that time comes from nowhere.
"I had a really difficult session, I was almost out in Q2. My first lap in Q3 was strong, and then I just went around Turn One on my final lap, I was a tenth and a half up, and then Turn 3, another tenth and a half up, and Turn 4, another tenth and a half, and the lap was unbelievable.
"Then obviously, I got that yellow flag in, a single yellow in the last sector, but I did a 100 meter lift, lost a huge amount of time, and still, I don't know, I don't have the answer for sure where it came from, but it felt very, very sweet."
