George Russell took Mercedes’ first pole position of the season, ahead of Red Bull’s Max Verstappen at the Canadian Grand Prix.
Russell and Verstappen set identical lap times of one minute and twelve seconds, but because the Briton took first place, he will start the race from first place.
Lewis Hamilton could only finish seventh in the second Mercedes, while Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri locked out the second row for McLaren.
Ferrari failed to get both cars into the top 10, with Charles Leclerc finishing 11th after winning in Monaco last time out, while teammate Carlos Sainz finished 12th.
Second Red Bull driver Sergio Perez was eliminated in the first session for the second race in a row – the last time he was in the top 10 on the grid was three races ago in Miami.
Russell’s pole position appeared to come out of the blue after a difficult start to the 2024 season, but is in fact the culmination of a series of upgrades made to the car over the past four races.
The cream color on top was a new front wing introduced in Monaco where only Russell had it before both cars used it in Montreal.
Russell, whose last pole was at the 2022 Hungarian Grand Prix, said: “Amazing. It feels so good. So much hard work went into it at the factory. We said in Monaco that we hoped this was the start of something for our season and I think it is.
“The car feels great since we brought some upgrades to Monaco. We were really in that battle. Let’s go for it tomorrow.”
Verstappen said: “It is what it is. We had a good qualifying. The whole weekend was still a bit difficult for us, but to get P2 I guess. Going into qualifying I would definitely have taken that. It also makes it more exciting for the race.”
Mercedes even lost speed in the final session – their lap times in the second part of qualifying were even faster. Russell was then 0.258 seconds faster and Hamilton 0.2 seconds slower, but still faster than the final pole time.
Verstappen said: “Q3 was the worst session for Mercedes. If you look at their pure pace, I’m happy with second place. In Q2 I looked at their lap times and thought there was no way I could do that.”
Norris himself was just 0.021 seconds off pole in a very closely packed session, with Piastri just 0.082 seconds behind him.
At RB, on the day it was announced that Yuki Tsunoda would remain with the team into 2025, Daniel Ricciardo sent a message by beating the Japanese to a Grand Prix for the second time this season.
Fernando Alonso finished sixth for Aston Martin, ending a difficult run of qualifying sessions in the previous three races by 0.473 seconds faster than teammate Lance Stroll in eighth.
The Aston Martins sandwich Hamilton, who was second fastest behind Russell after the first runs in the top 10 shootout.
Neither Mercedes driver improved on their second laps, but the 0.28 second gap between the two allowed six drivers to sit between them by the end of the session.
The last place in the top 10 was taken by Williams driver Alex Albon.
