2012 Spanish Grand Prix – Saturday Qualifying – Maldonado inherits pole after Hamilton demoted

The starting grid for the 2012 Spanish Grand Prix was decided after the Qualifying session was completed on track as pole-sitter Lewis Hamilton was excluded from the results on the grounds of not having returned to the pits after his pole-setting lap. This meant Pastor Maldonado inherited the P1 spot for Sunday’s race alongside Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso and the Lotus of Romain Grosjean in third.

Kimi Raikkonen occupies the second row alongside his teammate with Sergio Perez, Nico Rosberg, Sebastian Vettel, Michael Schumacher, Kamui Kobayashi & Henson Button rounding off the top ten.

2011 Korean Grand Prix – Saturday Qualifying – Hamilton breaks Red Bull Pole Dominance

Finally! We have a car that is not a Red Bull at the head of the order for a Sunday Race as McLaren and Lewis Hamilton broke the sequence of 15 consecutive pole positions from Red Bull. Lewis Hamilton will start the Korean Grand Prix from pole position while Sebastian Vettel could only manage second fastest time. Jenson Button will start from P3 with Mark Webber P4.

Ferrari lockout the third row as Felipe Massa will start fifth ahead of Fernando Alonso in sixth, Mercedes’ Nico Rosberg seventh & Renault’s Vitaly Petrov in eighth. Force India’s Paul di Resta and Adrian Sutil will start from ninth and tenth position respectively.

With the Drivers’ Championship sealed up, the Constructors Crown can also be done n’ dusted with as Red Bull need only a point to take that out. The other teams are just racing for pride and wins and with the sort of tumultuous season that Hamilton has had, he’d like to really get it back on track and show’em all with a win.

Ahem, not if Vettel or Button have anything to do to change that! Vettel to win with Hamilton second & Webber third. 😛

‘09 Belgian Grand Prix – Saturday Qualifying – Giancarlo Fisichella scores Force India’s first Pole Position

Giancarlo Fisichella scored Force India’s first-ever Pole position of their F1 career as he drove a superlative lap to take P1 at the Qualifying session for the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa-Francorchamps. It sure was a long time in coming and despite the steady improvements the team has been bringing into each of the last few races, no one expected a pole position for the team! Getting into Q2 and score points were their targets and they sure did better on the first one, can tomorrow’s race see them achieve their second target! I sure hope they do…

Toyota’s Jarno Trulli will start second on the grid as the Toyotas finally came good. So did the BMW’s who have Nick Heidfeld starting on P3. Rubens Barrichello will start fourth on the grid with Robert Kubica and Kimi Raikkonen behind him. Timo Glock, Sebastian Vettel, Mark Webber & Nico Rosberg make up the top ten on the grid.

Q1 was a very good session for Force India as Giancarlo Fisichella and Adrian Sutil were 1-2 atop the timesheets as the chequered flag fell and even though it was just the first session, it bode well for the team. A good way to impress the bosses at Ferrari since Fisichella’s being rumoured to fill-in for Felipe Massa for the last five races of the season! Luca Badoer again propped up the rear of the grid and to add insult to injury, he span out on his last flying lap and that was that! The ones to be relegated were Sebastien Buemi, Jaime Algersuari, Kazuki Nakajima, Romain Grosjean and Luca Badoer. Fernando Alonso escaped relegation by the skin of his teeth as he made a mistake on his flying lap and just scraped through another run just as the flag fell and so did Hamilton, who was teetering on 15th and must be thanking the heavens that no one went any faster!

Chinese Grand Prix: Hamilton Takes Pole

Ferrari and Kimi Raikkonen were fast throughout the Friday and Saturday practices and even in the Q1 and Q2 of Saturday Qualifying but right when it mattered – in Q3 – McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton banged in a storming lap to take pole position for Sunday’s Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai. Kimi had to be content with P2 and Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso are in P3 and P4 respectively. Red Bull turned in a strong performance with David Coulthard lining up 5th on the grid and teammate Mark Webber in 7th. Ralf Schumacher had a redeeming day of sorts when he put his Toyota 6th on the grid. BWM had an off-color day as Nick Heidfeld and Robert Kubica could manage only 8th and 9th fastest. Honda’s Jenson Button took the 10th place on the grid.

Q1’s notable scalp was Renault’s Giancarlo Fisichella and his teammate and last race’s 2nd placed Heikki Kovalainen scrapped only just into Q2 but had to content with 14th place. Jarno Trulli also had an off-day as he lined up 13th with the two Toro Rossos of Sebastian Vettel and Vitantonio Liuzzi ahead of him.

The weather forecast for sunday doesn’t look good…what with a Typhoon being predicted to hit the track!!! If it really does so, it should liven up things pretty considerably. In all of it, Alonso is the biggest loser as he has to get past the two Ferraris to get anywhere close to mounting a challenge on his teammate. As it stands, it would seem likely that Kimi will mount a challenge on Lewis right from the word go and Massa would hold off Alonso at bay!!! Either way, we are in for a cracker of a race.

Qualifying Reports: Formula1.com | BBC Sport | Grandprix.com