Lewis Hamilton has become the all-time pole position record holder after securing a 69th pole for this weekend's Italian Grand Prix during a mammoth session which lasted over three and a half hours following multiple rain delays.
The session started on time at 14:00 local time, but heavy rain showers hit the circuit and after just seven minutes the session was red flagged when Romain Grosjean span into the barriers.
Conditions failed to improve for more than two hours before the rain finally stopped and allowed qualifying to resume 160 minutes after it initially began, with 13 minutes of Q1 remaining.
Hamilton mastered the conditions to top all three sessions, despite worsening weather as the clocked ticked down. The Briton snatched pole in the very last minute of Q3 with a lap of 1:35.554 to go 1.1 seconds quicker than Red Bull's Max Verstappen.
The Red Bulls faired well in the conditions posting the second and third quickest times as Daniel Ricciardo was just a tenth adrift of his team-mate. However both will drop well down the order with various grid penalties.
That will promote Lance Stroll to the front-row alongside Hamilton as the Williams driver was fourth fastest.
Starting on row two will be Force India's Esteban Ocon, with the second Mercedes of Valtteri Bottas for company in fourth.
The Ferraris struggled in the wet and were only seventh and eighth quickest with Kimi Räikkönen pipping Sebastian Vettel, but will be promoted to fifth and sixth on the race grid.
Felipe Massa and Stoffel Vandoorne completed the top ten, as Sergio Perez narrowly missed out on a Q3 spot by just 0.002. The Mexican starts P11 from Daniil Kvyat, who is promoted ahead of Nico Hulkenberg and Fernando Alonso.
Penalties to be applied to race grid: Verstappen (20), Ricciardo (25), Hulkenberg (10), Palmer (15), Sainz (10) and Alonso (35).
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