Max Verstappen will start from pole position to set off in pursuit of the Chimera winner's trophy for the Italian Grand Prix.

In fact, in over half the races at Monza, the win has gone to a driver starting from the front row: 25 times from pole position and 14 from the second grid slot. The lowest grid position from which the race has been won is 11, which was down to Peter Gethin who was victorious in a BRM in 1971. That race is in the history books for the smallest winning margin (one hundredth of a second) between Gethin and second placed Ronnie Peterson. In fact, the first five past the chequered flag were covered by just 61 hundredths.

The Pirelli Pole Position Award was presented to the four time world champion by the Italian artist Nico Vascellari, who created the trophy known as "Chimera" which will be presented to the drivers on the podium on Sunday. Vascellari's work can be seen in important private collections and museums including MAXXI in Rome, the Bolzano Museum and the Museo del '900 in Milan.

This is Max's 45th pole, the second at Monza, following on from 2021. His time today of 1'18"792 is not only a record for this track, but is also the highest average speed (264.423 km/h) ever recorded in qualifying in the history of Formula 1, thus ensuring that Monza lives up to its nickname of the Temple of Speed.

Alongside Verstappen tomorrow will be Lando Norris in the McLaren (1'18"869), a time which also beat the existing lap record set in 2020 by Lewis Hamilton in 1'18"887. On the second row in third spot is championship leader Oscar Piastri (McLaren) with a time of 1'18"982 and in fourth place, last year's Monza winner, Ferrari's Charles Leclerc (1'19"007).

In the third free practice session, a further seven drivers - Piastri, Norris, Tsunoda, Stroll, Alonso, Colapinto and Gasly - did at least one proper run on a set of Hards, while Hadjar and the two Aston Martin drivers scrubbed in a set of the C3. This means Max Verstappen is the only driver to have saved both his sets of the hardest compound for tomorrow's race. In contrast, Hadjar has saved two sets of new Mediums, while the Mercedes duo of Kimi Antonelli and George Russell have two, even if they used a set in the first part of Q1, the only drivers to have used anything other than Softs in this session.

Mario Isola: "Once again a very closely contested qualifying, with all 20 drivers lapping within just over eight tenths of a second in Q1, while the top ten in Q2 were separated by less than three tenths. The final runs in Q3 were thrilling, ending with yet another demonstration of Max Verstappen's amazing talent. His pole is also significant, as the lap is the fastest ever recorded in Formula 1.

In qualifying, we saw that the Soft was clearly the fastest compound. Those like the Mercedes duo who ran the Medium were also competitive, indeed Russell was quickest in Q1 on the C4, but that was more down to him feeling more comfortable with a tyre that, while offering less performance, gave the driver more confidence. The C5 is a very quick compound but it is not easy to find its peak performance, as was proved by the fact it could produce excellent times even after one or two cool-down laps, or on a second run. This means that once it stabilised, the Soft might give the driver more confidence to push.

"In terms of strategy, from the three hours of free practice it's clear to see that this will be a race with only one pit stop. Medium and Hard should be the compounds doing most of the work, offering the best compromise between performance and durability and, between the two there's not much difference in terms of degradation. Having said that, the Soft could find itself with an important role, especially for drivers able to lengthen the opening stint at least to lap 32, or on the other hand, if there's a neutralisation towards the end of the race."

Check out our Saturday gallery from Monza here.