Russell takes pole as Mercedes dominate Australian Grand Prix qualifying

MELBOURNE, March 7 : George Russell took pole position and teammate Kimi Antonelli locked up the front row as Mercedes confirmed their off-season promise by dominating qualifying at Formula One's season-opening Australian Grand Prix on Saturday.

Briton Russell lapped Albert Park's street circuit in one minute, 18.518 seconds, a mark that was 0.293 seconds ahead of Italian Antonelli, who came back from a huge crash in the final free practice earlier in the day.

Red Bull's Isack Hadjar was third quickest but nearly eight-tenths of a second slower than Russell's best lap, the Silver Arrows' first pole since Lewis Hamilton in 2019.

"It was a great day, we knew there was a lot of potential in the car," said Russell.

"It really came alive this afternoon.

"Also really happy that Kimi's here... All in all a pretty good day."

Antonelli had a nervous wait for his position to be confirmed after his patched-up car dropped cooling fans onto the track early in the final session of qualifying.

McLaren's defending champion Lando Norris, who qualified sixth, ran over one, sending debris flying and triggering a red flag.

Stewards fined Mercedes 7,500 euros ($8,713) for releasing Antonelli's car from the garage in an unsafe condition.

"It's been a very, very stressful day," said Antonelli of his crash which also caused a red flag in practice.

"But the mechanics today were the heroes. We couldn't even set up the car, we just went out."

Ferrari's Charles Leclerc will line up fourth in Sunday's race, one ahead of McLaren's fifth-placed Oscar Piastri.

Red Bull's four-times world champion Max Verstappen crashed out of the first qualifying session (Q1) without recording a lap time, allowing his new teammate Hadjar to shine.

"It was a very smooth