F1 | Leclerc holds off Red Bull charge to take pole in action-packed Australian Grand Prix qualifying

Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc took the first Australian Grand Prix pole position since 2019 with a blistering performance at Albert Park – with Max Verstappen lining up second on the grid for Sunday’s race and Sergio Perez a provisional third.

The new layout relinquished a DRS zone ahead of FP3 – that session led by Lando Norris – on Saturday, with final practice seeing both Aston Martins crash and numerous drivers go off-track.

Verstappen topped Q1 and Red Bull team mate Perez led Q2 – the Mexican driver under investigation for not slowing for a caution in Q1 – but Ferrari regrouped and it was Leclerc who aced the top 10 shootout with a time of 1m 17.868s to keep Verstappen 0.286s at bay in P2.  –read more–