Ferrari have stunned Red Bull at the Mexico City Grand Prix with Charles Leclerc taking pole ahead of Carlos Sainz for a front row lockout during qualifying this morning.
Leclerc took back-to-back poles with a stellar lap of 1:17.166 to finish only six hundredths ahead of his teammate, with Max Verstappen nine hundredths further back in third.
(Photo by RacingNews365)
The star of qualifying however was Aussie favourite Daniel Ricciardo, who stormed to fourth in his AlphaTauri in what is only his second race back since his hand injury forced him out for several races.
Ricciardo was only two tenths behind Verstappen and finished ahead of the other Red Bull of Sergio Perez, the two Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton and George Russell and fellow Aussie Oscar Piastri in the McLaren.
The two Alfa Romeo’s of Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyou were also impressive, rounding out the top 10 in 9th & 10th respectively.
The biggest shock outside the top 10 was Lando Norris, who failed to make it out of Q3 after a spin by Fernando Alonso brought out the yellow flags and cost him a final run. He will line up a lowly 19th place.
Elsewhere it’s another difficult weekend for Aston Martin, with Alonso 13th and Lance Stroll 18th.
Ferrari fans will be hoping that a pole position will not be the peak of their performance for a second weekend running when the Mexico City Grand Prix gets underway at 7am (AEDT) tomorrow.
QUALIFYING TIMES
1 Charles LECLERC Ferrari 1:17.166
2 Carlos SAINZ Ferrari +0.067
3 Max VERSTAPPEN Red Bull +0.097
4 Daniel RICCIARDO AlphaTauri +0.216
5 Sergio PEREZ Red Bull +0.257
6 Lewis HAMILTON Mercedes +0.288
7 Oscar PIASTRI McLaren +0.457
8 George RUSSELL Mercedes +0.508
9 Valtteri BOTTAS Alfa Romeo +0.866
10 Guanyu ZHOU Alfa Romeo +0.884
11 Pierre GASLY Alpine 1:18.521
12 Nico HULKENBERG Haas +0.003
13 Fernando ALONSO Aston Martin +0.217
14 Alexander ALBON Williams +0.626
15 Yuki TSUNODA AlphaTauri NO TIME
16 Esteban OCON Alpine 1:19.080
17 Kevin MAGNUSSEN Haas +0.083
18 Lance STROLL Aston Martin +0.147
19 Lando NORRIS McLaren +2.474
20 Logan SARGEANT Williams NO TIME
This article was originally written for The Roar. You can read the published version here