Charles Leclerc will start the Australian Grand Prix on pole, brushing aside title rival Max Verstappen by almost three-tenths while Daniel Ricciardo claimed a season-best seventh on the grid.
It was Ricciardo’s first trip to Q3 this season and he posted a 1:19:032 to narrowly qualify behind the two Mercedes of George Russell (sixth) and Lewis Hamilton (fifth) and teammate Lando Norris in fourth.
Pending an investigation for speeding under waved yellow flags, Sergio Perez was third behind his teammate Verstappen and pole sitter Leclerc, who went quickest with his 1:17.868.
“It felt good, even more because it is a track I have always struggled on in the past,” Leclerc said. “As a driver, it probably doesn‘t fit me as well but this weekend we have worked hard.
“In Q3 I managed to put everything together so it feels great and very happy to be starting on pole tomorrow.
“Again we were quite surprised by our pace in qualifying so we will see what happens tomorrow.”
Verstappen said after qualifying that he’s been struggling with his Red Bull all weekend.
“I do not feel good,” he said. “I don‘t think there has been one lap where I have felt confident.
“It was a bit of a struggle. Of course, second is still a good result but it is hard to go to the limit.
“For me, this weekend so far has been all over the place, happy to be second, but as a team we want more.”
Q3 was red-flagged after Fernando Alonso lost hydraulics and crashed his Alpine into the wall while on a sizzling lap.
The red-flag came out as Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz was just metres away from completing his hot lap, keeping him down in eighth.
Sainz was then unable to put together a clean, final hot lap in the closing stages, and was also edged out by Esteban Ocon to bump him down to ninth.
Meanwhile, Ricciardo said he has been pleased with McLaren’s progress this weekend, but lamented a poor final lap in qualifying.
“Generally satisfied. It‘s the first Q3 of the year so from that point of view I’m happy,” he told Sky F1. “I think as well the whole weekend has been really good.
“The only ’eh’ was the last run, I went a second slower with the new set (of tyres), so that’s hurting a little bit. Not really sure why that was.
“It could have been a little better obviously, but generally happy with how the week has been so far.”
Asked about his chances in the race, Ricciardo said McLaren would challenge with Mercedes for a strong points-finish.
“(The car) feels all right,” he said. “There are a couple of quicker ones (around us), but in front of us Mercedes are obviously not their usual selves, so I think we could maybe put up a fight with them.
“We‘ll be all right tomorrow - I’m quietly confident.”
EARLIER
Earlier, qualifying was red-flagged during Q1 after a shocking crash between Lance Stroll and Nicholas Latifi as they headed towards Turn 5.
Latifi initially pulled back to let through faster cars, believing that Stroll — who overtook him — was on a cool lap and not preparing for a hot lap.
But Stroll then backed off himself, leading to Latifi getting back on the throttle to prepare for his own lap.
As he tried to go back around Stroll, the Canadian veered right, leaving his countryman nowhere to go.
The result was an ugly, high-speed coming together that ruined both drivers’ qualifying sessions, much to both of their anger.
“Latifi man, what the f**k was he doing, he‘s just f***ing hit me man!” Stroll said over team radio.
Latifi told his team: “I don‘t understand what he was doing. He wasn’t looking in his mirrors. The f**king car’s destroyed.”
Martin Brundle explained the moment as a “horrible misunderstanding” between the two drivers.
“That was a totally unnecessary accident for the pair of them.”
Speaking about the incident in the paddock, Latifi had no doubt that the crash was Stroll’s fault.
"For me, it's quite clear. I've just seen the video, I just tried to hold that line to prepare my out lap and he just turned into me once I was alongside him,” he said.
"There's not much more to say besides that."
Latifi and Stroll were eliminated from Q1 alongwith Sebastian Vettel, Kevin Magnussen and Alex Albon.
In Q2, Pierre Gasly, Valtteri Bottas, Yuki Tsunoda, Zhou Guanyu and Mick Schumacher were eliminated.
‘THEY’RE NOT HAPPY’
Less than 20 minutes before Practice 3, stewards removed on of the four DRS zones at Albert Park for “safety reasons”
The late notice delayed the entry of a number of cars as teams made changes to their set-ups.
“It’s not on though, is it? You’d think they’d make that decision earlier,” David Croft said in commentary.
Sky F1’s Karun Chandhok spoke to team managers after the session and said that “they’re not happy about it”.
Cars will now spend more of the lap with DRS closed, which he said will be a big disadvantage to the cars with more porpoising (bouncing at high speed) issues, such as Mercedes.
“They just don’t press a button - but it has a huge effect on the set-up. If you have DRS open, you have less porpoising,” Chandhok said. “Therefore, if you have DRS closed, the cars with more porpoising are disadvantaged - people like Mercedes etc.”
Chandhok said that one of the team managers pointed the finger at Alpine and Fernando Alonso who stand to gain from the shutting of a DRS zone.
“Alpine, it’s their gain and one of the team managers was pretty clear to me Fernando Alonso was one shouting loudest in the driver briefing that it’s a safety issue, ‘We need to get rid of the DRS’,” he said.
“Alpine are running lower downforce, so they’re going to have less porpoising issues.”
