Pierre Gasly put up a brilliant show and won his maiden pole in F1 by taking his Alpine teammate by surprise and beating the regular frontrunners in qualifying at the Italian Grand Prix.
On the very same day after the court had once again stripped him of his podium at the Monaco GP in June, Gasly was a surprise contender for pole despite qualifying at the fast Monza track.
Pierre Gasly takes pole position at the Italian Grand Prix! 😱🙌 pic.twitter.com/qJW2M0LjSw
— Sky Sports F1 (@SkySportsF1) September 5, 2026
According to Skysports, Gasly was already third fastest in the timings prior to the final Q3 session but he delivered a late surge of pace to beat George Russell to pole with a final lap timing of 1:21.786.
For Gasly, whose first pole in F1, in his 190th race, follows six years after he won the only victory of his career in a most unlikely fashion at Monza.
It is the first time that Alpine has qualified in pole position in F1, and also the first for the Renault-owned team based at Enstone since 2009.
Russell was to regret a “messy” final lap compared to Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, as he fell short of claiming pole position by 0.060s.
However, the British driver still gets to start on the second row in second place for the race where championship-leading teammate Kimi Antonelli will start from the back rows of the grid because of engine change penalties.
Antonelli, who helped Russell with a tow in qualifying, managed to secure seventh place but knew that he was going to be at the back wherever he qualified because of the engine penalties.
The third-placed qualifying driver for McLaren is Oscar Piastri, but he received a three-place grid penalty for blocking Red Bull’s Liam Lawson during qualifying.
