Antonelli beats Russell to Japanese Grand Prix pole

By

F1 Correspondent in Suzuka

Kimi Antonelli took his second pole position in a row as he beat Mercedes team-mate George Russell in qualifying at the Japanese Grand Prix.

Antonelli was fastest throughout the session and beat Russell by 0.298 seconds, despite not improving on his final run at Suzuka.

Russell also did not improve but still had enough to beat McLaren's Oscar Piastri, who will be joined on the second row by Ferrari's Charles Leclerc.

McLaren's Lando Norris was fifth after a troubled weekend so far, ahead of Lewis Hamilton's Ferrari, while Max Verstappen was knocked out in the second session and will start 11th.

Antonelli's first lap in the final session was 0.298secs quicker than Russell's. He was on course to improve on his final run but locked up into the hairpin and lost time.

The 19-year-old Italian said: "Super happy with the session. It was a good one, a clean one. And I felt very good in the car and every run I was just improving and improving.

"Shame about the last lap after a lock-up in Turn 11 but it was a good one before that."

Antonelli became the youngest driver to take an F1 pole position in China and is emerging as a serious threat to Russell in the championship - they start the race separated by four points, less than the margin between first and second places in a grand prix.

Russell, who was complaining of a lack of rear grip throughout qualifying, was quicker than Antonelli in the difficult first sector of the lap but lost out over the rest.

"Really strange session," the Briton said. "We were both very fast all weekend. We made some adjustments after final practice and in this qualifying we were nowhere so we have to try and understand."

Piastri, meanwhile, was pleased with the obvious progress McLaren have made this weekend, during which they have for the first time been in the mix with Ferrari as the closest challengers to Mercedes.

"We have looked good all weekend," said the Australian, who is yet to start a grand prix this season after a crash on the reconnaissance lap in Australia and a battery failure in China before the start.

"We don't have the pace to match Mercedes still but we are getting closer."

Leclerc, who was fastest in the first session of qualifying, looked as if he might threaten Antonelli's pole when he was 0.172secs faster through the the first sector on his final lap.

But an oversteer snap out of the Spoon Curve double left-hander put paid to his chances, although he was still quick enough to leapfrog ahead of Norris.

Hamilton has lagged behind Leclerc all weekend but he got to within 0.162secs in the final session to take up the final place among the big three teams.

World champion Norris has been beset by reliability problems this weekend, losing much of second practice to a hydraulic failure and half of final practice with another battery failure.

But he bounced back to be 0.277secs off team-mate Piastri by the end.

The top 10 was completed by Alpine's Pierre Gasly, Red Bull's Isack Hadjar, Audi's Gabriel Bortoleto and the British rookie Arvid Lindblad in the Racing Bull.

It was Lindblad who knocked Verstappen out of the top 10 shootout with his final lap of the second session.

Verstappen, who was 0.158secs slower than Hadjar in that session, complained over the radio that the car was "undriveable".

Briton Oliver Bearman, so impressive in the first two races, was knocked out in the first session, while at the back the Cadillac team convincingly beat struggling Aston Martin for the first time.

Sergio Perez, in the faster of the two Cadillacs, was 1.6secs quicker than Fernando Alonso's Aston Martin.

Alonso's only consolation at the first race after the birth of his son was that he extended his run of out-qualifying team-mate Lance Stroll to 39 grands prix.