Malaysian GP Qualifying - As it happened

by Adam Milleneuve on Apr 9th, 2011

Phew!  A proper battle for pole position - yes Vettel grabbed pole position but it was far from a walk in (albert) park as it was two weeks ago, with both McLarens taking the fight to Red Bull and only missing out by a single tenth of a second.

It's not just about pole position though, here's the qualifying session as it happened, round by round.

Qualifying Round 1

Both Hispania drivers will start the race after their best times were only 106% of the best Q1 time, so that's 24 cars to start the race on Sunday, good news for the struggling Spanish outfit.

Mark Webber worried a few folk, he spent the first round lounging around, ending up 15th - likely that Red Bull are sand-bagging, but quite why, we don't know.

Williams won't be happy though, despite all the promise of their new car, Maldonado took the final knock-out position in the first round and Barrichello was only a tiny bit ahead, finishing 17th and just scraping through to round 2.

POS	DRIVER	TEAM	BEST	DIFF	% DIFF (to best in Q1)
18	Pastor Maldonado	Williams	1'38.276	1.532	101.6%
19	H.Kovalainen	Lotus	1'38.645	1.901	102.0%
20	Jarno Trulli	Lotus	1'38.791	2.047	102.1%
21	Timo Glock	Virgin	1'40.648	3.904	104.0%
22	J.D'Ambrosio	Virgin	1'41.001	4.257	104.4%
23	Vitantonio Liuzzi	HRT	1'41.549	4.805	105.0%
24	N.Karthikeyan	HRT	1'42.574	5.830	106.0%

Qualifying Round 2

Disaster for Michael Schumacher, who finished the session in 11th, just shy of the final round of qualifying.  The Mercedes GP may not be the fastest car, but Rosberg was a full 0.6 seconds quicker than his 7-time champion team mate.  Ouch.

Paul Di Resta did well to out-qualify Adrian Sutil again, Perez had a good result in only his second qualifying session to finish 16th, while team mate Kobayashi got his Sauber into the top 10.

Jenson Button sprung a surprise with a spectacular lap time of 1.35.569, quicker than anything Hamilton or the Red Bulls could do.

POS	DRIVER	TEAM	BEST	DIFF	% DIFF (to best in Q2)
11	M.Schumacher	Mercedes	1'37.035	1.466	101.5%
12	Sebastien Buemi	Toro Rosso	1'37.160	1.591	101.7%
13	J.Alguersuari	Toro Rosso	1'37.347	1.778	101.9%
14	Paul Di Resta	Force India	1'37.370	1.801	101.9%
15	R.Barrichello	Williams	1'37.496	1.927	102.0%
16	Sergio Perez	Sauber	1'37.528	1.959	102.0%
17	Adrian Sutil	Force India	1'37.593	2.024	102.1%

Qualifying Round 3 - Pole Position Shoot-out

In short, the Ferrari team were running a damage-limitation approach, with just one run and seemingly no pace to take the fight to Red Bull and McLaren.  These two teams were even closer than anyone expected, but yet again the 2010 champion pulled out a stunning lap to grab pole position for the 17th time so far in his short career.

Nick Heidfeld managed to grab 6th for Renault, which he and the team will be pleased with and will go someway to silencing his critics following Australia.

POS	DRIVER	TEAM	BEST	DIFF	% DIFF (to Pole)
1	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull	1'34.870	-	-
2	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren	1'34.974	0.104	100.1%
3	Mark Webber	Red Bull	1'35.179	0.309	100.3%
4	Jenson Button	McLaren	1'35.200	0.330	100.3%
5	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	1'35.802	0.932	101.0%
6	Nick Heidfeld	Renault	1'36.124	1.254	101.3%
7	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	1'36.251	1.381	101.5%
8	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	1'36.324	1.454	101.5%
9	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1'36.809	1.939	102.0%
10	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber	1'36.820	1.950	102.1%

Can Webber find a way to take the fight to Vettel on Sunday?  He's in the same machinery and needs a good result to keep tabs on the 2010 champion.