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7 hours ago
3
Monaco Grand Prix
Venue: Monte Carlo Dates: 23-25 May Race start: 14:00 BST on Sunday
Coverage: Live commentary of the race on BBC Radio 5 Live; live text updates on BBC Sport website and app
McLaren's Lando Norris snatched pole position for the Monaco Grand Prix from local hero Charles Leclerc's Ferrari with the final lap of qualifying.
Norris beat Leclerc by 0.109 seconds as the second McLaren of Oscar Piastri took third place ahead of Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton.
Red Bull's Max Verstappen, so far the McLaren drivers' only title rival, could manage only fifth place for Red Bull.
Racing Bulls' French rookie Isack Hadjar took sixth place ahead of Aston Martin's Fernando Alonso.
McLaren chose a different approach to the final part of qualifying than their rivals, choosing to go out early and do two flying laps on a set of soft tyres.
Norris was faster than Piastri on both runs, by less than 0.1secs on the first and just more than that on the second.
Leclerc, third after the first runs in the final session after topping all practice sessions, leapt to the top of the leaderboard with his final lap, to cheers from the crowd in his home city.
But behind him the McLaren drivers were embarking on their final laps.
Piastri was initially up on Leclerc's time, but his lap slightly fell away from him, and the Australian fell short of the Ferrari by 0.066secs.
But Norris managed his lap to perfection to set a new track record at Monaco and grab pole.
It was an important statement for Norris, who has been overshadowed by Piastri this season and the Briton trails his team-mate by 13 points heading into the race. It was his first pole since the opening race of the season back in March.
Norris said: "It's been a long time coming. I feel good. I don't think you realise how good this feels through quite a few struggles over the last few months, especially here; Monaco is a beautiful track to do it especially up against the hometown hero. Very pleased.
"It was a nice lap, a well put-together lap. It feels good when it all comes together."
Leclerc, disappointed to miss out on pole, rued traffic on his first lap of final qualifying, which he said meant he went into his final run blind.
"There is always more to be done but this was the best we could do," he said.
"The lap was really good. We know we don't quite have the car to go for wins this year but this weekend the car felt good, starting second here it is going to be tricky to take that first place."
Piastri said: "Intense, as it always is around here. It was quite reminiscent of last year. My first lap felt good and then the second I made a mistake in the harbour chicane and left a little bit there.
"Still pretty happy, it's been a pretty messy weekend so far so come out with a lap I thought was pretty good and third, I'm pretty happy with.
"I think I've hit more walls this weekend than in my whole career. I've just been struggling to get into the groove. We have been doing some digging this weekend and to come out with a third is pretty good."
Hamilton's fourth place, 0.319secs off Leclerc, was his best qualifying result of the season apart from taking pole for the sprint in China.
He faces an investigation for impeding Verstappen in the first part of qualifying, and if he is found guilty would get a grid penalty.
Verstappen was 0.606secs off pole and faces a difficult race, even with the mandatory minimum two-step strategy imposed on all teams this year in an attempt to add extra intrigue and interest to the race.
The four-time champion said: "I felt straight away in Q1 we were lacking quite a bit in sector two. All the low-speed mechanical grip corners where the track drops away from you and you have to ride kerbs, that's where we struggled the most and we never seemed to improve a lot.
"It's just a weakness we have in the air, the low-speed corners are not good, we know that, and it just highlighted again this weekend."
Mercedes' George Russell qualified only 14th after his car broke down in the tunnel at the start of the second session, with a suspected battery problem.
And his team-mate Kimi Antonelli crashed at the end of the first session after hitting the inside wall at the chicane, and will start 15th.
Briton Oliver Bearman qualified 17th in his Haas but has a 10-place penalty for impeding in Friday practice and will start from the very back as a consequence.
