NURBURGRING: Mark Webber secured pole position for Sunday’s German Grand Prix with a blistering performance in Saturday’s tense and competitive qualifying session.
Driving his Red Bull car with great poise and assurance, the 34-year-old Australian demonstrated his liking for the Nurburgring circuit by delivering his second pole in succession, his third this year and the ninth of his career.
Webber clocked a fastest lap of one minute and 30.079 seconds to take the prime starting position ahead of Briton Lewis Hamilton who produced a brilliant effort to take second less than one-tenth of a second behind him in his McLaren.
“That was a wicked lap,” said Hamilton after relegating defending champion and runaway leader Sebastian Vettel in the second Red Bull to third – and off the front row of the grid for the first time this year.
Vettel was only able to take third place ahead of two-times champion Spaniard Fernando Alonso and his Ferrari team-mate Felipe Massa who was fifth after a dramatic finale to qualifying.
German Nico Rosberg took sixth for Mercedes ahead of Briton Jenson Button in the second Mercedes, Russian Vitaly Petrov of Renault and seven-time champion local hero Michael Schumacher, 42, in the second Mercedes.
‘Schumi’ was 2.4 seconds off pole.
After a tense opening mini-session in Q1, Massa wound up fastest having used a set of soft tyres, but out went Japanese Kamui Kobayashi of Sauber, Finn Heikki Kovalainen of Lotus, Timo Glock of Virgin.
The Q2 session saw Mexican Sergio Perez out early for Sauber followed by the hungry-looking Massa whose fastest time was soon overhauled by Alonso and then Hamilton. (Agencies)
