The final qualifying session of the 2022 Formula 1 season got under way at the Yas Marina Circuit located in Abu Dhabi, the capital and second-most populous city of the United Arab Emirates on Saturday, November 19th.

Red Bull dominated the session with 2022 World Champion Max Verstappen taking the pole, 0.2s quicker than teammate Sergio Perez. Verstappen gave Perez a tow to help his lap. Perez is in a battle with Ferarri's Charles Leclerc for the second position in the 2022 F1 Drivers Standings.

Leclerc qualified just four hundreths of a second slower than Perez. Leclerc's teammate, Carlos Sainz, qualified behind Leclerc in P4.

"Out on track, Charles and Carlos gave their best and improved their performance lap by lap, executing this session in a solid way," said Laurent Mekies, Ferrari Racing Director. "That resulted in us locking out the second row, with Charles within a whisker of Perez's time."

"P3 is the best we could do today. It was quite a tricky qualifying, especially in terms of tyre management, as is usually the case in Abu Dhabi, with the rear tyres overheating in the final sector," said Leclerc.

Despite a 1-2 finish in FP1 on Friday and a 3-4 finish in FP3 on Saturday afternoon, the Silver Arrows of Mercedes qualified P5 and P6 on Saturday evening, with Lewis Hamilton leading teammate George Russell. Both drivers were 0.68 seconds off the pace set by Verstappen and with just three thousandths of a second separating their respective qualifying times.

"We had a solid FP3, looking like we were sitting between the Red Bulls and Ferraris on single lap pace so it's disappointing to end up 5th and 6th," said Mercedes Engineering Director, Andrew Shovlin. "Through the weekend it has felt like we are at our best on the hot track and struggling to find the grip in the cooler evening conditions."

McLaren Racing had a good performance on Saturday at Abu Dhabi with Lando Norris qualifying seventh and teammate Daniel Ricciardo rounding out the top 10. Norris and Ricciardo finished the earlier Free Practice session, P5 and P8, respectively.

"It was a case of looking for marginal gains in FP3, after some good work on set-up and balance during Friday, together with further steps overnight, we took an approach of fine tuning and working out best approach to qualifying," said James Key, Executive , Technical Director at McLaren.

"It was good to get both cars through to Q3, the margins were tight in all three sessions but both drivers had the pace to make the top 10," added Key.

Alpine Racing's Esteban Ocon qualified P8.

Four time World Champion, Sebastian Vettel, in his final qualifying session as a full time Formula One driver qualified P9 for Aston Martin.

"Overall, my final qualifying in Formula One was a good session," said Vettel. "The car is doing what I want this weekend and this has contributed to this decent result. I have been very motivated and it felt as if there was a bit extra in me today."

Vettel holds the record for being the youngest World Champion in Formula One. He also has the third-most race victories (53) and podium finishes (122), and fourth-most pole positions (57).

In 2022, Vettel has 10 top ten finishes for Aston Martin.

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QUALIFYING RESULTS 
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 Pos	Driver		Team		Time		Gap

1	Verstappen	Red Bull	1:23.824	140.933 mph
2	Perez		Red Bull	1:24.052	0.228
3	Leclerc		Ferrari		1:24.092	0.268
4	Sainz		Ferrari		1:24.242	0.418
5	Hamilton	Mercedes	1:24.508	0.684
6	Russell		Mercedes	1:24.511	0.687
7	Norris		McLaren		1:24.769	0.945
8	Ocon		Alpine		1:24.830	1.006
9	Vettel		Aston Martin	1:24.961	1.137
10	Ricciardo	McLaren		1:25.045	1.221
11	Alonso		Alpine		1:25.096	
12	Tsunoda		AlphaTauri	1:25.219	
13	Schumacher	Haas		1:25.225	
14	Stroll		Aston Martin	1:25.359	
15	Zhou		Alfa Romeo	1:25.408	
16	Magnussen	Haas		1:25.834	
17	Gasly		AlphaTauri	1:25.859	
18	Bottas		Alfa Romeo	1:25.892	
19	Albon		Williams	1:26.028	
20	Latifi		Williams	1:26.054	

(image provided by Aston Martin F1 Media)