Leclerc's stunning pole, De Vries beats Latifi - Talking points from Italian GP qualifying

Charles Leclerc secured a brilliant pole position in front of Ferrari's adoring fans at Monza. The Monegasque set a blistering time to take the position from Red Bull's Max Verstappen and Ferrari teammate Carlos Sainz.

Verstappen and Sainz are among nine drivers who will be taking grid penalties for power unit-related issues.

Here are three talking points from qualifying for tomorrow's Italian Grand Prix.

QUALIFYING CLASSIFICATION @Charles_Leclerc takes his eighth pole of the season! #ItalianGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/xhIYae12fg

Ferrari throwing everything at Monza

Coming into the race weekend, it was widely assumed that Verstappen and Red Bull would be the ones to beat, but no one expected Ferrari to be as competitive as they were around the 'Cathedral of Speed'. With their cars adopting an extremely low downforce setup, Leclerc and Sainz set about qualifying with one goal: secure pole.

And they did!

READ: WRAP | 2022 Italian GP - Leclerc sends the Tifosi into overdrive with stunning pole

Leclerc's final lap was 0.145 seconds quicker than Sainz's, and 0.268sec better than Verstappen's. In the second Red Bull, Sergio Perez was more than a second off the pace.

Ferrari had the high-speed edge over Red Bull, with Sainz registering a 348km/h top speed through the speed trap - 6km/h faster than Verstappen.

Ferrari came to Monza knowing full well that the championship is effectively over, but they wanted to give the Tifosi something to cheer about on their home ground, and they did.

CHARLES: “I’m very happy with the lap. It’s been a great weekend up to now. I hope we can [repeat] 2019 tomorrow”#ItalianGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/hpTQFlUACs

Red Bull goes with… downforce?

One can almost question Red Bull's thinking behind their approach to this