Australian GP: Hamilton beats Rosberg to secure 50th career pole

What a stunning opener!

The 2016 Formula One (F1) season is officially underway following a wondrous qualifying session just now in the Albert Park Lane in Melbourne, Australia.

Mercedes closed the qualifying rounds in a fashionable manner as last year’s champion Lewis Hamilton successfully beat team mate Nico Rosberg to claim the season’s first pole position and also his 50^th pole throughout his career.

The new qualifying format, which was suggested to make its debut in the Spanish Grand Prix in May was pushed forward to take over the full season by starting in Australia to ease the complications. No doubt, it was an exciting start as viewers were undeniably attracted to the new format and their loud cheers did not go unrecognized.

With many assuming the wet tyres would make its appearance due to the abysmal weather yesterday, the overall temperature of track and the humidity did not produce any downpour like the past few days.

Round 1 started with flare as all drivers were seen in great form. The first seven minutes were nerve-wrecking as all drivers were putting pressure on the oil avoid getting eliminated.

Hamilton and Nico Rosberg led the laps from the start and maintained great pace throughout the whole session. The first driver to be eliminated was surprisingly Manor’s Pascal Wehrlein, followed by team mate Rio Haryanto. Despite the high expectations set by the viewers, the Manor duo just could not make the cut.

Newcomers Haas too weren’t able to impress when Esteban Gutierrez and Romain Grosjean ended their bid at P20 and P19 respectively.

Ferrari certainly emerged as a potential threat to the Silver Arrows as both Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen ended their run ultimately at P3 and P4, ahead of Toro Rosso’s Max Verstappen at P5.

On about his victory, Hamilton was elated and described the laps today as ‘sexy’ and that they had a good flow whereas team mate Rosberg was rather unhappy about being in second place and vows to perform better in the main race tomorrow.

With 58 laps to go, who will be the first champion of the season tomorrow?

The following table shows the grid line-up for tomorrow.

Other posts by Michelle Liew