Charles Leclerc bests , Lewis Hamilton, Sebastian Vettel to take Russia pole

Russian GP

Leclerc bests Vettel, Hamilton to take Russia pole

Four in a row for Charles!

Matthew Scott

Saturday 28 September 2019 15:09 Updated: 15:13

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Charles Leclerc secured pole position for the fourth race in a row, beating Ferrari team-mate Sebastian Vettel and Lewis Hamilton to P1 at the Russian Grand Prix.

The Scuderia have been in a class of their own all weekend, having won the last three races.

Leclerc has been the man in top form, despite Vettel's victory in Singapore, and he is the first driver other than Hamilton and Nico Rosberg to take four consecutive pole positions in the V6 Hybrid era.

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Hamilton managed to sneak second place from Vettel for the second race running, and will start the race on harder tyres than Ferrari to prompt an interesting strategy battle, but the Silver Arrows' 100 per cent winning record in Sochi appears set to fall come Sunday.

Vettel's inability to lock out the front row alongside Leclerc may be a concern for Ferrari, although the chances of the German picking up a slipstream off the line could undo the damage.

Max Verstappen qualified quicker than Valtteri Bottas in fourth, but he will drop to P9 on the grid after taking a new engine into this weekend. His Red Bull team-mate Alexander Albon went out in Q1 after crashing.

Carlos Sainz once again took best of the rest for McLaren on the day the team announced they will split from Renault in 2021, with the French team's Nico Hulkenberg and Lando Norris immediately behind. Romain Grosjean and Daniel Ricciardo round out the top 10.

Q2

Just two tenths of a second separated Carlos Sainz in eighth with Kevin Magnussen in 14th as the margins to make the top 10 proved wafer-thin. The Dane was on the wrong side of the ledger alongside Antonio Giovinazzi, Sergio Perez and Pierre Gasly, who has a penalty coming. Lance Stroll was a few tenths further back from those he went out with.

Q1

Albon spun into the barriers at Turn 13, damaging his rear-end to likely bring on further penalties than the five-place grid drop he entered the weekend with. Daniil Kvyat did not take part after an engine issue in FP3, with Kimi Raikkonen going out alongside the Williams pair of Robert Kubica and George Russell, who qualified over a second quicker than his team-mate.