Charles Leclerc takes his debut pole in Bahrain for Ferrari, with team-mate Sebastian Vettel second to secure the Scuderia’s 62nd front-row lock-out.
Leclerc broke the track record under the flood lights of Sakhir Circuit with a 1:27.866; the only driver to post a time underneath 1:28.000.
Sit back, relax, and enjoy @Charles_Leclerc's first F1 pole lap ?#BahrainGP ?? #F1 pic.twitter.com/uU7Kx2VDXw
— Formula 1 (@F1) March 30, 2019
“I’ve worked really hard for today’s result, extremely happy,” Leclerc said after qualifying.
“I learned a lot from my teammate Sebastian Vettel.”
Vettel ended the session 0.294 second adrift of Leclerc’s pole lap in second, just ahead of Mercedes’s Lewis Hamilton.
The German, who was only able to complete one run in Q3 due to a tyre mix up in Q2, reflected on his performance:
“Maybe I was a bit shy in the second sector [on my Q3 run], but I think Charles did a very good job today and he deserves to be on pole.”
Vettel added: “The main thing is that we got the job done, this weekend the car felt a lot better.”
Hamilton was only 0.030 seconds behind Vettel and only 0.060 second in front of team-mate Valtteri Bottas.
“Charles did an incredible job,” Hamilton said.
“Tomorrow’s the more important day and we’ll give Ferrari a good fight.”
F1: Five Classic Bahrain Grand Prix Moments
Max Verstappen ended qualifying in fifth for Red Bull whilst the sister car of Pierre Gasly had another poor performance.
Subsequently, Gasly dropped out in Q2 and could only manage 13th on the grid for tomorrow’s race.
The Haas of Kevin Magnussen lead the midfield battle in sixth, who was 0.050 seconds ahead Carlos Sainz Jr. in the McLaren.
The second Haas of Romain Grojsean was initially eighth, but was handed a three-place grid penalty by the stewards for blocking Lando Norris’ McLaren during Q1, and dropped to 11th.
This elevated Alfa Romeo’s Kimi Raikkonen to eighth and Norris to ninth place.
It was a very strong showing from the British outfit beating their engine providers Renault and proving that their pace in Melbourne was not a fluke.
Renault driver Nico Hulkenberg had been fast all weekend consistently beating out his team-mate Daniel Ricciardo, but the encouragement disappear when it mattered.
Ricciardo struggled during free practice with his car but it was surprisingly the Aussie who knocked his team-mate down to 17th to create the biggest shock of the session. Ricciardo will start tomorrow’s race from tenth place.
At Toro Rosso, Alex Albon out qualified Daniil Kvyat again as the Russian suffered car issues, while Racing Point’s Sergio Perez will be 14th on the grid, ahead of Antonio Giovinazzi and team-mate Lance Stroll who joined Hulkenberg and the two Williams’ of George Russell and Robert Kubica in the Q1 drop zone.
Can Mercedes pull something out of the bag? Will Vettel strike back? Or can Leclerc become the latest driver to win a Grand Prix?
Tune in tomorrow at 4:10 GMT for live coverage of the Bahrain GP on Sky Sports F1 to find out!
