Charles Leclerc will be looking to clinch his second victory of the new year ahead of Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton when the five red lights go out to start today’s Australian Grand Prix. The Ferrari man took the chequered flag at the season-opening race in Bahrain but was beaten by Verstappen at the last time of asking in Saudi Arabia and will be desperate to enact revenge over the course of this morning’s 58-lap event on the streets of Melbourne.
Leclerc managed to put his car on pole position ahead of second-placed Verstappen with a scintillating lap at the end of yesterday’s qualifying session. He ended up three-tenths of a second clear of his Red Bull rival, who starts ahead of Sergio Perez and Lando Norris in third and fourth respectively.
Meanwhile, Hamilton will be hoping to force his way into contention for a top-three finish after securing a respectable fifth-placed grid slot after last month’s disastrous showing in Saudi Arabia. The seven-time champion, who currently has a heavier car than fellow Mercedes driver George Russell due to a new data-collecting tool on his chassis, still remains some way off the pace of the leaders with the Silver Arrows having failed to meet their own lofty standards over the course of the new campaign to date.
Follow CityNews’ live updates from the Australian Grand Prix below.
The safety car is called back into the pit lane at the end of lap six before Charles Leclerc successfully manages to hold his advantage at the restart.
The Ferrari man looked far quicker than Max Verstappen along the home straight and will now be tasked with pulling away from his Red Bull rival over the next few laps.
Carlos Sainz’s race already looks to be over!
The Spaniard beaches his Ferrari in the gravel at Turn 10 and is unable to get back up and running.
The safety car is quickly deployed, with Charles Leclerc still leading the way ahead of Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton.
Charles Leclerc gets a brilliant start and manages to keep Max Verstappen at bay into Turn One!
Lewis Hamilton also starts well and manages to get up into third place after passing Lando Norris and Sergio Perez.
Meanwhile, Carlos Sainz appears to be struggling for pace on the hard tyres and is all the way down in 14th!
Here’s a final reminder of your starting order ahead of today’s race.
Home favourite Daniel Ricciardo will be looking to secure a points-paying finish from seventh on the grid, while Carlos Sainz will have plenty of work to do to earn a spot on the podium after only managing to put his Ferrari in ninth.
We’re just 10 minutes away from the start of the formation lap and the drivers are strapping themselves in and getting ready to go.
Charles Leclerc has insisted that he is determined to convert pole position into his second Grand Prix victory of the new year by holding off the threat of Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez from the word go.
“I am feeling good, obviously I am extremely happy to be starting on pole today,” said the Ferrari driver.
“It is going to be a tricky race as always but we have had the pace until now so now we just need to finish the job. We have got the pace.
“It is a bit difficult because with Max and Checo, I am a bit on my own without Carlos because he got unlucky yesterday but hopefully he can come back soon and have a good race from there.”
Lewis Hamilton was unable to hide his frustrations over the pace of his Mercedes car after he was forced to settle for a fifth-placed finish at the end of Q3.
However, the 37-year-old also insisted that slow progress is being made to put things right after a hugely difficult start to the campaign on all fronts for the Silver Arrows.
“I feel like my lap, I feel like there was a little more in the car so that is a positive,” Hamilton told Sky Sports F1.
“I am also naturally gutted that I wasn’t able to extract that little bit but the problem is when you push that car a little bit more she is quite spiteful, she is like a viper or like a rattlesnake, you never know.”
Fernando Alonso has revealed that he will be taking part in today’s race with injured thumbs due to the impact of his crash towards the end of qualifying.
The Spaniard was hit with a gearbox issue at Turn 13 and was unable to prevent his Alpine car from sliding off the track and slamming into the barriers at the edge of the circuit.
“I’m fine,” said the Spaniard. “Obviously yesterday I held the steering until the last moment before the crash, just to save the front wing.
“But I had no power steering at that moment, we had nothing. It was an extension of the thumbs, so it is a little bit painful now, but it’s going to be OK for the race.”
Alonso was unable to prevent his brush with the barriers in Q3 (Image: GETTY)
Charles Leclerc grabbed his second pole position of the new season with a scintillating lap at the end of Saturday’s qualifying session.
The Ferrari man was 0.286 seconds clear of Max Verstappen at the top of the order, with Sergio Perez in third and Lewis Hamilton down in fifth.
However, Leclerc’s team-mate Carlos Sainz only managed to complete one Q3 lap on cold tyres and will start today’s race from ninth on the grid.
The session was also disrupted by two red-flag periods, with Lance Stroll and Nicholas Latifi clipping each other in Q1 before Fernando Alonso collided with the barriers on his flying lap towards the end of Q3.
Credit,DailyExpress,CN,Getty Images
Apex Igbo socio-cultural organisation, Ohanaeze Ndigbo Youth Council Worldwide on Friday came down hard on…
Food and petrol price hikes have pushed Nigeria’s inflation to 33.88 percent in October 2024,…
The late Chief of Army Staff, Lt. General Taoreed Lagbaja has been laid to rest…
Former Nigerian senator, Ben Murray-Bruce, has revealed how he was defrauded of $3.5 million by…
President Bola Tinubu has bestowed a posthumous award of the Commander of the Federal Republic (CFR) on…
By Rabiu Usman It was President Bola Tinubu that declared that in the first half…
