Formula 1 championship leader Max Verstappen beat Carlos Sainz to pole position for the Australian Grand Prix after clinching a 1m15.915s on his final run of Q3.
Verstappen had not headlined a single session across the weekend so far, but dialled in his pace throughout the qualifying sessions and found a quarter-second advantage at the very end to deny Ferrari a chance at pole. Sainz had been fastest in both Q1 and Q2 and looked set to challenge for pole on his return to F1 after missing the Saudi Arabia round with appendicitis, but found a far more concerted challenge from Verstappen in the top-10 shootout.
This nonetheless kept the Williams driver ahead of Valtteri Bottas, who was 13th ahead of Kevin Magnussen. Esteban Ocon survived an early Q1 wall-bang at Turn 14 to progress into the intermediate phase of qualifying, but could go no faster than 15th having been almost 0.3s shy of Magnussen's time ahead. Daniel Ricciardo was dumped out in Q1 after losing his best lap in the session to a track limits violation in Turn 5, which promoted Magnussen into a Q2 appearance to spare Haas' blushes.
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