Lewis Hamilton's pole position lap at the 2016 Australian Grand Prix was 2.5s faster than the lap that secured him his place at the front of the grid at the same race last year.
Hamilton's impressive lap time was overshadowed by the flop of Formula One's new qualifying format, but underlines the speed of development among teams as they enter the third year under the current set of regulations. Part of the performance gain can be attributed to the tyres after Pirelli brought super-softs to Melbourne this year on top of the soft and medium compounds used last year, but that does not account for all of the 2.5s gain.
Hamilton managed a 1:23.837 to take pole this year, compared to last year's 1:26.327 and Albert Park's qualifying lap record set by Sebastian Vettel's Red Bull in 2011 of 1:23.529. Hamilton's 2016 lap was also over 0.5s faster than Michael Schumacher's pole position lap in 2004 during the height of the V10 era, which is often referenced as F1's zenith in terms of lap time.
"My engineer showed me that we were very close to those times, but I didn't realise we were as fast as they were back then," Hamilton said after setting the lap. "I'm definitely quite surprised, but it's a good sign and quite cool. The car feels better everywhere [compared to last year]. Last year was pretty good, but it's just been raised higher everywhere."
The performance gain also raises questions over Formula One's objective of making the cars and tyres four to five seconds faster in 2017. If as much as 2.5s can be found in one year of normal development under stable regulations, would five seconds in 2017 -- a target originally set against the baseline of the 2015 cars -- really be that big a step?
"It's impressive to make such a jump [compared to last year]," Nico Rosberg said after qualifying second in Australia. "If they are targeting five seconds for next year, then we have already gone half the way! That's pretty impressive.
"The tyres are a bit of unknown and that changes it -- how much quicker have Pirelli made the tyres? Not only the ultra-soft, which has given us one second, but maybe all the tyres are quicker because of how they are built. I don't know. It's difficult to know that, but faster is always good."
However, lap times in the race remain a long way off the pace of 2004 when Schumacher set Albert Park's official in-race lap record of 1:24.125. By contrast Sunday's lap record, set by Daniel Ricciardo's Red Bull, was 1:28.997.
In 2004 cars were allowed to refuel, meaning they were running significantly lighter throughout the race. What's more, lap times would lower towards the end of the stint as the fuel levels came down whereas in modern F1 tyre degradation usually results in slower lap times the longer a driver stays out.
Nevertheless, to underline the progress made over the winter, the fastest lap in 2015's race was a 1:30.945, nearly two seconds slower than Ricciardo's 2016 fastest lap.