MELBOURNE: Lando Norris clinched pole position on Saturday for the season-opening Australian Grand Prix ahead of teammate Oscar Piastri as McLaren fired a warning shot to their rivals.
In scorching hot conditions at Melbourne’s Albert Park, world champion Max Verstappen came third in tense qualifying.
Mercedes’ George Russell will keep Red Bull’s four-time world champion company on the second row. Lewis Hamilton will start in eighth on his Ferrari debut.
“It’s the perfect way to start the year. A big congrats to the team, everyone has done an amazing job to start with a one-two,” said Norris after his 10th career pole.
“But it is just quali, right? Let’s see tomorrow,” he added.
“The car is extremely quick. When you put it together it is unbelievable, but it is hard to put it together.
“I’m never going to get ahead of myself, I’m confident the car is in a good place but we have never run it in the wet.”
The forecast for Sunday’s race is cooler temperatures and rain.
Norris eclipsed his rivals with a flying lap of one minute 15.096 seconds on soft tires, 0.084sec ahead of Piastri.
“Pretty happy, great to start the year on the front row,” said Piastri.
“Pretty happy with how qualifying went but just not quite enough in Q3, but it is a long season so a good start,” added the Australian.
“Maybe left a little bit on the table.”
No Australian driver has won their home race since Alan Jones in 1980, but that was a non-championship race before Australia was added to the F1 calendar in 1985.
Verstappen, who was the pole-sitter in 2023 and 2024, was three-tenths behind Norris.
But his rookie teammate Liam Lawson, who replaced the underperforming Sergio Perez, failed to get out of Q1.
Mercedes’ teenager Kimi Antonelli was another big Q1 casualty after gravel damaged the floor of his car.
“It was good, yesterday was quite tough so for us to be P3 today, I’d take that,” said Verstappen.
“Quali laps are exciting, good grip around here and some fast corners.”
Verstappen is chasing a second win in Australia after his 2023 victory to kickstart his bid for a fifth consecutive world title, a feat only Michael Schumacher has achieved.
RB’s Yuki Tsunoda will start a surprise fifth alongside the Williams of Alex Albon.
Ferrari pair Charles Leclerc and Hamilton were a disappointing seventh and eighth with Alpine’s Pierre Gasly and Carlos Sainz in the other Williams filling out the top 10.
Last year in Melbourne it was a Ferrari one-two with Sainz holding off teammate Leclerc for the win, ahead of Norris.
“It isn’t quite where we wanted to be but overall I’m satisfied with the progress we have made over the past two days,” said Hamilton.
“We didn’t expect to be eight or nine tenths behind pole but given this is a weekend of firsts for me, I didn’t underestimate how steep the learning curve would be.”
Fernando Alonso and his Aston Martin teammate Lance Stroll have struggled for pace all weekend and failed to get through Q2 alongside Sauber’s Gabriel Bortoleto, RB’s Isack Hadjar and Alpine’s Jack Doohan.
Haas’s Ollie Bearman failed to set a time in Q1 and was eliminated with teammate Esteban Ocon, Sauber’s Nico Hulkenberg, Lawson and Antonelli.
Briton’s Bearman has endured a horror weekend, smashing into the barriers in first practice on Friday and unable to take part in the second session.
He skidded into the gravel Saturday on his first lap in third practice, before reporting his gearbox was “broken” without completing a lap in qualifying.
