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Norris pips Piastri to pole in dominant Australian GP qualifying for McLaren
Peter McGinley • March 15th, 2025 8:36 pm
Lando Norris has narrowly beaten teammate and hometown hero Oscar Piastri to pole position for the Australian Grand Prix, in a dominant opening qualifying session of the 2025 season.
Norris set a benchmark of 1:15.096, just 0.084 seconds ahead of the Aussie, who in turn finished 0.3 seconds ahead of Red Bull’s Max Verstappen.
“It’s the perfect way to start the year,” said the pole sitter, post qualifying.
“Let’s wait and see tomorrow, I know it’s gonna be a tricky race, but today was perfect.”
Piastri meanwhile was content with the McLaren front-row lockout but would have liked to have gone one better.
“[I’m] pretty happy. It’s such a great start to the year to be on the front row...one position further back than I would have liked, but now we reset and see what tomorrow has in store,” said the Aussie.
“I’ve been happy with how I’ve driven, there’s nothing majorly I’ve been kicking myself about. The gap’s very tight obviously, and just needed that little bit more.”
While content with the result for the team, Piastri did highlight one apparent area of weakness of McLaren’s MCL39 race car.
“I went a bit deep in turn 11, and I think with these tyres and the hot temperature, as soon as you slide them a little bit or get them a bit dirty, they drop off a lot,” he said.
“I struggled a lot with the last sector, and then went off at the second last corner.
“I think that’s the fine line around here and I think that’s been a little bit of a struggle with our car so far, it’s been quick, but it bites at times.
“I’m pretty happy with the job I did but I’ll see where we could have been a little bit better.”
While a solid result for McLaren, a front row start for Piastri provides the best possible opportunity to convert his qualifying result into a podium or race win in front of his home crowd.
He spoke post qualifying of his experience third time out in Melbourne at the race track he grew up a 15 minute drive from.
“This is the most relaxed I’ve been at my home race,” said the Aussie.
“I think the first two years, especially the first year I came here, it was a pretty overwhelming experience, and even last year it was still a pretty big experience.
“I think this year I’ve just been able to enjoy it a bit more, maybe because I’ve been more confident with the car under me.
“I’ve really been enjoying it, enjoying the support, and the support’s gone up a little bit since last year as well.
“It’s great to have all the home support, and very much appreciate it.”
Fourth in qualifying was George Russell for Mercedes, ahead of Racing Bulls’ Yuki Tsunoda in fifth, off the back of a strong showing in Friday’s second practice.
Sixth was Alex Albon from Williams, who beat both Ferraris, with Charles Leclerc edging out Lewis Hamilton in his debut qualifying in red.
Pierre Gasly’s Alpine was ninth, while Carlos Sainz was tenth, completing a double Q3 appearance for Williams and continuing their strong Bahrain testing form.
The qualifying result for Williams was in stark contrast to Albert Park 12 months ago, where the team was struggling and could ultimately only field one car, on account of a lack of spare parts available.
Jack Doohan the second Aussie in the field was knocked out in Q2 and could only manage 14th.
Ollie Bearman's nightmare of a weekend at Albert Park continued, with a gearbox issue discovered when he took to track in Q1 - the British driver was heard on team radio advising he was unable to shift to fourth gear and quickly returned to the pits without setting a lap time.
The problematic gearbox comes on top of the 19 year-old's crash out of FP2 on Friday, and subsequent spin out and beaching in the gravel in FP3 on Saturday. He heads into the Grand Prix tomorrow with barely 13 laps of running around the Albert Park circuit.
The 2025 Australia Grand Prix gets underway at 4:00pm AEDT on Sunday
