Vettel takes pole in Spa

Vettel Does it Again

Sebastian Vettel stormed to his first pole position at Spa, leaving the rest of the drivers in his wake.

Vettel made the most of the changing conditions and was the last of the front runners to cross the line. Lewis Hamilton looked like he might have taken the first non Red Bull pole, but only seconds later Vettel had ruined his party.

Mark Webber could only manage a time, which was over a second slower than his teammate and claimed third. Ferrari had been struggling to get their tyres to warm up quickly enough, but it was Felipe Massa who managed to get them working the best in the end. The Brazilian put his car on to fourth on the grid, while Fernando Alonso could only manage eighth.

Bruno Senna was taking part in his first qualifying session, since Abu Dhabi last year, and showed he hasn’t lost any speed. Despite a slight mishap in the first practice session, the newly appointed Renault driver out qualified his teammate. Senna slotted in to seventh, while Vitaly Petrov failed to make an impression down in 10^th.

Jaime Alguersuari enjoyed his best qualifying position of his career and popped his car just behind Nico Rosberg, in to 6^th. The Toro Rosso’s seemed to enjoy the conditions and both put in some very fast times. Finishing off the top ten was Sergio Perez, who lapped Spa just a tenth of a second slower than Alonso.

 

Q2

Wet weather and a red flag, due to an Adrian Sutil crash, wreaked havoc on the second session. A huge queue formed in the pit lane, as the drivers waited for the session to be restarted. Jenson Button was probably the biggest loser, as the times tumbled and the track improved, and he was shoved down in the 13^th.

His teammate was involved in a very controversial ending to the session, when he was side swiped by Pastor Maldonado. Hamilton went down the inside of the Williams driver, in his attempt to get in to the final qualifying session. The Venezuelan seemed to take offence to it and appeared to deliberately hit his rear left wheel against the side of the McLaren.

Maldonado qualified down in 17^th; just ahead of Heikki Kovalainen, who managed to get in to the second session. Sebastian Buemi lost out in the final moments and he will start in 11^th, with Kamui Kobayashi sat behind him. Rubens Barrichello and Sutil rounded off the rest of the drivers, knocked out in Q2.

 

Q1

Michael Schumacher was the first victim, in the opening qualifying session, after he lost a wheel. The German champion was sent flying in to the barriers, when his right rear wheel came loose and rolled down the track. He will now have to start the race from the back of the grid, not the best way to celebrate his 20 years in F1. Paul di Resta also fell foul in the dying seconds, when Kovalainen jumped passed him and left him to start 18^th.

The ever improving McLarens, especially Button’s time, made the 107% time more and more difficult to reach. Timo Glock only managed to slip inside the time, by just over half a second, with around three minutes left of the session. Jerome D’Ambrosio will have to hope the stewards will let him race in his home Grand Prix, after finishing over a second outside the cut off time.

Behind the two Virgins was Vitantonio Liuzzi, who was very close to D’Ambrosio’s time. Daniel Ricciardo didn’t do his career chances any help, by only clocking a time two seconds outside of the 107% time.

Posted by Sadhbh O'Shea - Follow her on twitter @SadhbhOS.

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