• Australian Grand Prix

Vettel takes pole as Red Bull dominate

ESPNF1 Staff
March 27, 2010 « Sydney aiming to take Australian GP form Melbourne | »
Sebastian Vettel put in a stunning lap for pole © Sutton Images
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Sebastian Vettel took pole position ahead of team-mate Mark Webber, as Red Bull put on a dominant display in qualifying ahead of Sunday's Australian Grand Prix.

Ferrari's Fernando Alonso was the only man even close to the Red Bulls, after all the other competitors failed to find a competitive pace on soft tyres in the final session. The most disappointing showing of all was from Lewis Hamilton who missed out on Q3, claiming he was unable to extract any more from the car in the conditions. He will line-up eleventh on the grid, eight places off his McLaren team-mate Jenson Button, who proved the MP4-25 was capable of more by qualifying fourth. He said he got the very best out of the car but was still over half a second off Alonso and three quarters of a second off Vettel.

Felipe Massa was fifth after struggling for tyre temperature, ahead of the Mercedes of Nico Rosberg and Michael Schumacher who both bolted on hard tyres in the closing stages. Williams' Rubens Barrichello, Renault's Robert Kubica and Force India's Adrian Sutil rounded off the top ten and will be in the hunt for points tomorrow.

Rain threatened to fall throughout the hour but it didn't feature. The track temperature was lower than it was during practice and that might account for McLaren and Hamilton's problems. On Sunday's grid he will have the Toro Rosso of Sebastian Buemi lining up next to him, after a solid lap saw him qualify ahead of four cars separated by less than a tenth of a second. Leading that pack was Tonio Liuzzi in the Force India, ahead of Pedro de la Rosa in the Sauber, Nico Hulkenberg in the Williams, and Kamui Kobayashi in the other Sauber. Jaime Alguersuari rounded out the top 17.

Vitaly Petrov suffered the first major setback of his rookie year, failing to make it through to Q2 and leaving himself nine places shy of his Renault team-mate Kubica on the grid. He was two seconds clear of the usual suspects at the back of the grid, with Lotus' Heikki Kovalainen leading the battle of the new teams, some five seconds off the pace of Vettel. He was ahead of team-mate Jarno Trulli, the two Virgins and the two HRTs.

Rain is still a threat for Sunday's race and the chances of a safety car are high on the tight but high-speed Albert Park circuit. Red Bull is looking strong but the result s far from decided.

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.
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