Official F1 Journal Formula 1 Qualifying Round Up- Australia

The news off the track before Qualifying was still the withdrawal of Logan Sargeant by William so that Albon could take his Chassis after a big crash in Practice 1 damaged his and because of time and Financial constraints Williams did not bring a 3rd Chassis to the race. It was a real shame for Logan but Technical Director James Vowles was forced to race the driver most likely to score points and develope the car which is Alex Albon. 
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Qualifying 

Q1-All Ran Softs 

As the first round of Qualifying began cars were lined up waiting for the Pitlane light to go green. Albon was the first man out and he had a few scary moments on the track blaming lots of dust and leaves for the mistakes but he lost the time ultimately for taking to much kerb at turn 9.
Perez was under investigation for possibly impeding Nico Hulkenberg on his first flying lap and team mate Verstappen was complaining about his Redbull understeering more than he would like. Ocon gave the wall at turn 14 a kiss causing a puncture on his Alpine. 
With 10 minutes on the clock Russell set his first lap but it was only good enough for 14th behind Albon over a second off the fastest time of Leclerc. Team mate Hamilton went 6th fastest on his first run and the Piastri and Norris went 3rd and 4th fastest. Alonso was the next man to top the times 3 tenths ahead of Verstappen in 2nd. 

7 minutes to go the Ferrari's went fastest with Sainz just beating Leclerc by 0.25 as we saw most of the cars return to the pits to set up for their final runs. Gasly and Ocon set their laps out of sink with the rest of the field with Gasly going 14th and Ocon staying bottom. 
3 minutes on the clock Verstappen and Perez were setting purple sectors and Albon on a great lap put his Williams up to 4th till  Perez and Verstappen went 2nd and 3rd fastest. 
2 minutes to go and everyone except Leclerc, Alonso, Albon Sainz and Perez were out on track pushing hard to get out of Q1, with Gasly, Ricciardo, Zhou and Ocon in the drop zone till Ricciardo went 10th and safe pushing Hulkenberg into the drop zone. Ocon put in a great lap going 15th fastest, out of the drop zone and pushed Magnussen down and possibly out until Ricciardo had his lap deleted dropping him to 18th and Magnussen back to 15th and Q2.  

Q1 Result 

1 SAI 1'16.731      2 PER +0.074
3 VER +0.088       4 LEC +0.253
5 ALO +0.260        6 RUS +0.331
7 ALB +0.399         8 TSU 0.625
9 PIA +0.638         10 STR 0.645
11 NOR +0.699     12 HAM 0.768
13 BOT 0.812        14 OCO +0.886
15 MAG 0.978        16 HUL +1.245
17 GAS +1.251      18 RIC +1.354
19 ZHO +1.457     

Q2 All Ran Softs 

The Ferrari's went straight out in Q2. Carlos Sainz doing a mega job after his operation 2 weeks ago that he is still visibly recovering from when he is walking around the paddock. He set the first time of the session a 1'16.671 till Verstappen beat it by 0.284 on his first lap. Norris was purple in sector 1 on his first go of Q2 till Piastri bested him and went fastest in the 1st sector. Piastri went 2nd fastest when he crossed the line, behind Verstappen and ahead of Sainz while team mate Norris could only manage 5th. 
Hamilton and Russell were struggling to drag a time out of their Mercedes only going fast enough to go 7th and 8th, but were ahead of the 2 Aston Martins after everyone had completed their first timed runs. 

6 minutes to go Sainz was back out on fresh Soft tyres that took him to the top of the times by almost 2 tenths over Verstappen.
Ocon was trying his hardest to get the pace out of his Alpine car in a valiant effort to see Q3 for the first time in 2024 but his best was only good enough for 15th. 
 2 minutes to go the drop zone was Albon, Tsunoda, Magnussen, Bottas and Ocon. Albon didn't do another lap so wouldn't progress to Q3 Hamilton was down in 9th and didn't improve his position on his final lap. Bottas, Ocon and Tsunoda were all on faster laps, Tsunoda jumped to 9th pushing Stroll into the drop zone but Stroll crossed the line and jumped to 8th dropping Hamilton into the drop zone and out of Qualifying, with Team mate Russell in 9th very nearly joining Hamilton in being knocked out. It was a tough day for Mercedes all around.  

1 SAI 1'16.189   
2 LEC +0.115
3 VER +0.198
4 PIA +0.412
5 PER +0.442
6 ALO +0.521
7 NOR +0.561
8 STR +0.591
9 TSU +0.602
10 RUS 1'16.901
11 HAM +0.059
12 ALB +0.266
13 BOT +0.439
14 MAG +0.526
15 OCO +0.796

Q3 All Ran Softs

All the cars filed out without to much of a hurry, to start the final round of Qualifying. Sainz again was the first man to set a time  with a 1'16.331,  half a second ahead of the next man to set a time Russell in his Mercedes, Leclerc also couldn't beat his team mates time but Vertsappen could and after setting purple sectors, went top by 0.283 over Sainz, Perez could only manage 4th after his first lap, the Mclaren's lead by Norris were 5th & 6th. Alonso found the gravel at turn 6 ruining his 1st Q3 attempt and Stroll waited in the garage to set his time while the track was clear as the others cars prepared for their 2nd attempts. 

With 2 minutes to go Stroll completed his first (quite scruffy) lap only managing to go 8th fastest and as he crossed the line, the other cars were starting their final flying runs, Verstappen was rapid in his Redbull, Saniz was purple in sector 1 with Leclerc and Perez also improving, Max beat his time at the top stretching his gap to the others, Sainz kept 2nd fastest, Perez 3rd, Norris was 4th, his team mate and Aussie home favorite Piastri crossed the line 6th fastest, behind Leclerc who bailed on his final attempt, his 1st run being good enough to take 5th overall. Russell made the best of a bad day finishing in 7th ahead of Tsunoda who had a great Qualifying for RB, Stroll who out qualified team mate Alonso, he crossed the line in 9th and Alonso could only manage 10th after his mistake on his first lap. 
After Qualifying Perez was penalized for impeding Hulkenberg in Q1 and was dropped 3 places. He would start 6th for the Grand Prix, promoting Norris to 3rd, Leclerc to 4th and Piastri to 5th.  

Result Q3 

1 VER 1'15.915
2 SAI  +0.270
3 NOR +0.400
4 LEC +0.520
5 PIA +0.657
6 PER* +0.359
7 RUS +0.809
8 TSU +0.873
9 STR +1.157
10 ALO +1.637

* -3 place grid penalty for impeding Hulkenberg 

Joanna Blackmore 
Writer @f1journal.co.uk