Bearman sinks, Hadjar takes off: Rookies have had mixed fortunes in Australian GP qualifying

How can we not welcome the Parisian's first qualification in Formula 1 Since the start of the weekend, it was enough to look at the timesheet to understand that, as in the Bahrain tests, Isack Hadjar is close to his teammate Yuki tsunoda. The number 6 is a few tenths behind, which is understandable given his rookie status, but he's not out of the running. Better yet: he's clearly in the game with his garage neighbor.

In qualifying, Hadjar quickly showed his pace, easily making the cut for Q1 with a 12th fastest time, just a tenth behind Yuki Tsunoda. Unfortunately, the Japanese driver then managed to advance to Q3, where the Frenchman was left behind with a frustrating 11th fastest time.

"It's not bad." The Racing Bulls driver still smiled, after having failed to beat the time by 0 seconds. Pierre Gasly, 10th and last qualified for Q3. “It’s frustrating to be 6 hundredths of a second off Q3. I had a good feeling in Q1, but on the lap in Q2, I couldn’t do any better. I felt less comfortable with the car and that didn’t improve on the last attempt. Even though I did a good