Hamilton: Pole lap close to perfection

Lewis Hamilton hailed his record-breaking pole lap for the Australian Grand Prix as close to "perfection" as was possible. The world champion qualified his Mercedes on pole in a record-breaking time of one minute 21.164 seconds on Saturday, leaving the Ferraris of Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel in his wake.

Raikkonen and Vettel qualified second and third respectively, but the Ferrari pair were six tenths off Hamilton's stunning final flying lap.

Hamilton also took the record for pole positions in Australia for his own, having topped Saturday honours for the seventh time at Melbourne Park, moving ahead of Ayrton Senna.

The fight for first had initially looked like going down to the wire when Hamilton, Vettel and Max Verstappen were separated by six hundredths of a second after initial runs in Q3, but the "party mode" available to Mercedes this year helped the world champion deliver another phenomenal lap.

"You would think that with the results we had it would be the norm but it isn't, it's so intense and my heart is racing," Hamilton said on the grid.

Lap record smashed! ?

His seventh #AusGP pole! ?@LewisHamilton ????????????#DrivenByEachOther #AusGP ???????? pic.twitter.com/hNs91J5FNZ — Mercedes-AMG F1 (@MercedesAMGF1) March 24, 2018

"I'm so happy with that lap. It was such a nice lap. I'm always striving for perfection and that was as close as I could get.

"I'm always in party mode.

"What was surprising was to see how quick the Ferraris were. During that lap I was in the same modes as before but it was hooking up the tyres and getting the lap together."

Hamilton's team-mate Valtteri Bottas crashed out in Q3 after slamming into the wall at turn two, causing damage which could prompt grid penalties on Sunday.