LECLERC’S MASTERPIECE TO TAKE POLE AT MONZA

Charles Leclerc handed Ferrari a home pole position in a close contested qualifying session for the Italian Grand Prix, with the Monegasque driver finished just over a tenth of a second ahead of Max Verstappen who will slip back down the grid as one of a number of driver with penalties for tomorrow’s race at Monza.

At the start of Q1 Verstappen jumped to the top of the order. He was joined at the top of the timesheet by team-mate Sergio Pérez, with the Mexican crossing the line just five hundredths of a second off the Dutchman.

Sainz Jr. then gave his Ferrari team-mate Leclerc a strong tow and the Monegasque driver took P1. Sainz Jr., who will drop towards the back of the grid, slotted into second ahead of George Russell.

Pérez went for a second run and he improved to take P3 but he soon dropped to fourth place as Verstappen improved, more than two tenths ahead of Leclerc.

Eliminated at the end of the final runs of Q1 were Nicholas Latifi, Sebastian Vettel and Lance Stroll and the Haas cars of Kevin Magnussen and Mick Schumacher.

At the start of Q2, Pérez on new softs, took top spot, but Verstappen immediately went quicker. Sainz Jr., though, rose to P1 ahead of Leclerc who ran just 0.057s ahead of Verstappen.

Once again at the end of the session, the top four stayed in their garages. And as the final times arrived there were no improvements significant enough to dislodge any of the top drivers.

Behind them, Hamilton, also set for penalties, went through in P5 and Russell progressed in sixth place ahead of the McLaren pairing of Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo, while Alonso and Gasly were ninth and tenth.

Ruled out at the end of Q2 were Esteban Ocon in the second Alpine, Valtteri Bottas, Nyck de Vries, standing for the unwell Alex Albon, Zhou Guanyu in the other Alfa Romeo and Yuki Tsunoda. The 15th-placed Japanese driver, who will start from the back of the grid due to penalties, did not set a time in the segment.

At the start of Q3 Sainz Jr. took provisional pole with a good lap of 1:20.584, almost two tenths of a second ahead of Leclerc with Verstappen in third place, half a second ahead of Pérez who claimed fourth place.

Leclerc, though, found more pace on his final flyer and he claimed pole position. Max got closest to the Ferrari driver and a superb final flyer, in a more draggy car, handed him P2 in the session, just 0.145s behind his rival. Sainz Jr. took third place ahead of Checo with Hamilton fifth ahead of Russell.