Lewis Hamilton made a euphoric statement of intent as he raced to a dominant pole position for Sunday's Australian GP.The battle between the top three teams had looked very close throughout qualifying but on a spectacular final lap, the world champion set an incredible 1m21.164s to finish two-thirds of a second clear of the field.The pace of the Briton and his Mercedes wasn't the only thing that stood out from the first qualifying of the new season, however, so here are five things learnt from Saturday's action in Melbourne.

1. Mercedes still the kings over a single lap

Continuing with the performance of Hamilton, the most important conclusion is he and his Brackley-based team very much remain the fastest pairing over a single lap. 

The key, just like last year, is the additional engine modes available on the Mercedes, allowing for a significant boost of power over a short period of time.

Before deploying it, Hamilton, Sebastian Vettel and Max Verstappen were covered by just 0.06s, after, the difference was 0.715s as the Briton found almost nine-tenths with his final run.

That kind of improvement is going to be very difficult for Ferrari and Red Bull to match and if the result is Mercedes starting the vast majority races on the front row, stopping them will be even harder.

2. McLaren flatter to deceive

Heading into 2018 one of the stories anticipated was the rebirth of McLaren after dumping Honda in favour of Renault engines after three tough years.

A tricky testing blighted by overheating issues caused some alarm bells to ring, but the performance in qualifying in Australia will certainly lead to questions.

Neither Fernando Alonso or Stoffel Vandoorne could make it inside the top ten in 11th and 12th respectively, meanwhile, the Renault works team were surprisingly ahead with both cars making Q3.

It is likely the performance will improve as the season progresses, indeed, it will probably be better in two weeks in Bahrain.

However, after harbouring ambitions of race wins and podiums this year, to not even lead a midfield is massively disappointing.

3. A competitive, but slow midfield

What is also worrying is the performance differential between the top three teams and the rest of the grid.

With a winter of development, many expected the field to have closed up but the 1.1-second margin between Daniel Ricciardo in fifth (dropping to eighth after penalty) and Kevin Magnussen in sixth is still huge.

The only positive is the competition as, before the season, many would have considered the idea of Haas sitting 'best of the rest' as ridiculous yet here they are with Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean starting fifth and sixth on Sunday.

They have matched Renault and McLaren, both of whom were expected to make much more ground and will be the most frustrated about the gulf that remains to Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull.

Force India and Williams also have the potential to join that fight as they better understand their 2018 cars but Sauber continues to trail despite their new Alfa Romeo partnership.

4. Bottas crumbling under the pressure

One mistake may not seem much, but already the early signs are not good for Valtteri Bottas at the start of a big year for the Finn at Mercedes.

With every performance under scrutiny and his teammate Hamilton romping ahead, the need to stay in touch saw him push the boundaries a little too far as the former Willams driver ended his session in the barriers.

His crash was as much misfortune, after just putting two wheels onto the wet grass, as it was anything else.

But with Mercedes needing Bottas to do as much a team game to help Hamilton as provide competition, starting at least P15 is not what he needed.