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| Sebastian Vettel © Gallo Images |
Sebastian Vettel claimed a hat-trick of pole positions on Saturday after pipping Red Bull teammate Mark Webber in final
qualifying for Sunday's Hungarian Grand Prix.
This was Vettel's seventh pole of the season and 12th of his
career and the Red Bull team have now taken 11 poles from the 12
available.
The 23-year-old German dominated from the get-go and clocked a
time of 1 min 18.773sec on his penultimate lap, almost half a
second quicker then Australian Webber.
The Red Bull duo were in a league of their own, again, almost a
second quicker than their nearest rivals, Ferrari's Fernando Alonso
and Felipe Massa.
Fifth-placed Lewis Hamilton, McLaren's championship leader, said
he could do nothing but "laugh" at the amazing pace of the Red
Bulls.
"It's second in the middle sector and half a second in the final
sector - I don't know whet they're doing but it's incredible,
they're just so fast," the 2008 champion remarked.
Vettel dedicated his pole to his team for the phenomenal job
they have done and hopes to have a more trouble-free start than he
did in Germany last weekend.
"I said on the radio to the boys 'this is your moment'. I said
'you built this wonderful car'. It was a pleasure to drive.
"This circuit suits us. You need to know the track but you need
to have the car. The track suits our car so we are little bit
quicker than the rest. We found the problem from last week that
made the bad start so hopefully we can have a normal start
tomorrow."
Red Bull team principal Christian Horner reflected: "This was
probably our most dominant qualifying of the year."
Since the Hungaroring is notoriously difficult to overtake
around, Alonso is hoping that a good start on Sunday will help put
him in contention with the high-flying Red Bulls.
"We did our job which is to be best of the rest." he said.
"Hopefully tomorrow we can make it a more difficult race for
them (Red Bull) because so far this weekend it has been too easy.
"The start is important, it is difficult to overtake - strategy
will be important but we know the start will be 60-70 percent of
the race."
German Nico Rosberg was sixth quickest for Mercedes followed by
Russian Vitaly Petrov who out-qualified his Renault teammate Pole
Robert Kubica for the first time this season.
Spaniard Pedro de la Rosa of Sauber will start in ninth ahead of
Williams driver Nico Hulkenberg in tenth.
Vettel led the Red Bull assault in the Q1 opening mini-session
which saw Japanese Kamui Kobayashi of Sauber eliminated along with
the three new teams.
Kobayashi appeared to have been held up by Bruno Senna of
Hispania on his final flying lap and was pipped to the 17th fastest
time in the final minute of the session by Force India's Adrian
Sutil.
That meant he joined Timo Glock of Virgin, Lotus drivers Heikki
Kovalainen and Jarno Trulli, Lucas Di Grassi in the second Virgin
and Senna ahead of his Hispania team-mate Sakon Yamamoto.
McLaren's worst fears were realised in Q2 when their defending
drivers' world champion Jenson Button failed to make the top ten.
Button will start in 11th place on Sunday ahead of Rubens
Barrichello in the second Williams, Sutil, German Michael
Schumacher in the second Mercedes, Sebastien Buemi of Toro Rosso,
Vitantonio Liuzzi in the second Force India, and Jaime Alguersuari
in the second Toro Rosso.
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