2011 Spanish Grand Prix - Qualifying

Mark Webber surprised many as he beat teammate Sebastian Vettel to pole position at the Spanish Grand Prix. The Red Bull's piped Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso.

Q1 started with little drama. The main activity was in the Renault garage, around Nick Heidfeld's car. In Free Practice 3, Quick Nick's car caught fire, and the Renault mechanics had to rush to get his car ready for Q1. In the end, their efforts were for no reason, as the twenty minutes elapsed. This meant that there was one less position for the other 23 drivers to fight over. As suspected, the Virgin's and HRT's filled up the last four spaces, but ahead of them, Rubens Barrichello was struggling in his Williams, and with the Lotus car going fast on the soft tyres, the Brazilian was pushed out of Q1. Replacing him was Heikki Kovalainen, making it into Q2 for this first time in 2011.

Q2 started with even less action, as it took 2 minutes for a car to appear. Eventually the cars pored out, and the last 10 minute saw all the drivers fighting to be in Q3. There were no real surprises, bar Pastor Maldonado. The Venezuelan managed to easily out-qualify his teammate, and making it into Q3. Elsewhere, Kovalainen managed to beat the two Force India's who decided to only qualify on the harder tyres, saving a set of softs for the race. Joining them in exiting Q2, were the two Sauber drivers, and the two Toro Rosso drivers.

In Q3, all eyes were on the front. Could anyone out qualify the Red Bull's, or even Sebastian Vettel? The answer was Yes! As the McLarens and Red Bulls did their first flying laps, Mark Webber stole the show, easily beating the times set by Vettel, Hamilton and Button. Just like Turkey, Vettel and Webber believed this to be enough, and did not try to do another lap. It was a correct decision, and Mark took his first Pole Position since the 2010 Belgian GP.

Grid For Tomorrows Grand Prix
Pos - Driver - Team - Rank
1 - Mark Webber - Red Bull - 2
2 - Sebastian Vettel - Red Bull - 1
3 - Lewis Hamilton - McLaren - 3
4 - Fernando Alonso - Ferrari - 4
5 - Jenson Button - McLaren - 5
6 - Vitaly Petrov - Renault - 16
7 - Nico Rosberg - Mercedes - 8
8 - Felipe Massa - Ferrari - 6
9 - Pastor Maldonado - Williams - 35
10 - Michael Schumacher - Mercedes - 14
11 - Sebastian Buemi - Toro Rosso - 17
12 - Sergio Perez - Sauber - 37
13 - Jaime Alguersuari - Toro Rosso - 20
14 - Kamui Kobayashi - Sauber - 19
15 - Heikki Kovalainen - Lotus - 13
16 - Paul DiResta - Force India - 28
17 - Adrian Sutil - Force India - 10
18 - Jarno Trulli - Lotus - 15
19 - Rubens Barrichello - Williams - 7
20 - TImo Glock - Virgin - 18
21 - Vitantonio Liuzzi - HRT - 22
22 - Narain Karthikeyan - HRT - N
23 - Jerome D'Ambrosio - Virgin - 34
24 - Nick Heidfeld - Renault - 12