Qualifying Report - Lando tops McLaren front row

Lando Norris, Italian GP 2023
© McLaren

By Peter Habicht

McLaren continued to show their strength in qualifying today with another strong performance from Lando Norris under the sunshine at the Italian Grand Prix taking pole position with a 1:19.327s lap in Q3, .109s quicker than teammate Piastri. The pair were nearly a tenth quicker than closest rival George Russell in his Mercedes GP, and well clear of the Ferraris of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz.

Russell teammate Lewis Hamilton was sixth fastest and over three tenths in front of the Red Bulls of Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez. Verstappen struggled on the newly resurfaced circuit as his car suffered from sudden oversteer on the limit early in the final round.

Williams' Alex Albon and Haas' Nico Hulkenberg rounded out the top ten after Aston's Fernando Alonso narrowly missed out on making the final round by 0.01s. Team RB's Daniel Ricciardo and Haas Team's Kevin Magnussen qualified 12th and 13th respectively. The Australian has been driving in an older spec car this weekend compared to his teammate and a new gearbox for Magnussen was fitted after failure late in final practice.

Alpine's Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon were both eliminated in Q2, taking 14th and 15th for tomorrow's race. Ricciardo teammate Yuki Tsunoda didn't make it past Q1 in his upgraded RB sharing afterwards that he had "A lot of things to understand with this new floor."

Lance Stroll put his Aston in 17th ahead of Williams' Franco Colapinto on his F1 debut weekend and the Saubers of Valtteri Bottas and Guanyu Zhou.

15 of the last 24 races at Monza have been won from pole, making today's result more relevant than qualifying at Monaco, so the Woking team appear poised to keep their World Constructor's fight strong against Red Bull who currently lead 434 to 404 this season.

The Italian Grand Prix will start at 4p tomorrow.