Lewis Hamilton takes an easy 50th pole position in Australia - Elimination format sees Mercedes ahead of Ferrari
Published by Christine
With the new elimination style qualifying underway, we saw the expected results of Manor and Haas dropping out early, but the surprise of Daniil Kvyat also failing to get out of Q1. The Red Bull driver was left in the garage rather than out on track defending his lap time which put him firmly in 18th place.
The new format was supposed to mix things up a bit but the midfield looked familiar – Sauber were next up, Renault ahead of them, McLaren in 12th and 13th which was an improvement on last year at least, and then Force India sneaked into the top ten, although that was still Q2.
Eight drivers participated in the final session, although it came to an end relatively early after most were happy with their benchmark times. Only Rosberg improved to finish second behind his teammate, with Ferrari locking out the second row of the grid. Max Verstappen did a great job to finish fifth, ahead of Massa, Sainz and Ricciardo rounding out the top eight.
