Hamilton storms to Valencia pole


EUROPEAN GRAND PRIX
Venue: Valencia Dates: 21-23 August 2009 Coverage: Live coverage of Friday's practice sessions, Saturday qualifying and Sunday's race - which starts at 1300 BST - across BBC TV, radio and online platforms. Find full listings here

Hamilton has not secured pole position since the China Grand Prix last October


By Andrew Benson
BBC Sport in Valencia


World champion Lewis Hamilton secured his first pole position of the season with a scintillating qualifying display at the European Grand Prix at Valencia. The Englishman, who won the last race in Hungary, beat team-mate Heikki Kovalainen to seal a McLaren front row.
Brawn's Rubens Barrichello is third, with team-mate Jenson Button fifth behind Sebastian Vettel's Red Bull.
Button's closest title challenger Mark Webber will start ninth in his Red Bull behind Renault's Fernando Alonso.
Both Red Bull's drivers have closed the gap on Button as the Englishman struggled in the last three races.
But Brawn have bounced back to form here while the hot conditions have left Red Bull comparatively struggling.
McLaren, though, have left all the teams slightly breathless as they seek to build on Hamilton's victory in Budapest and he is fancied to win a second race in a row.
606: DEBATE

Kovalainen must be on a light fuel load to put in that performance on the final sector - he'll hold up the pack and Lewis will run away with it



20ledge-kb

The Hungarian race marked a watershed for McLaren, who st
arted the season poorly, but have bounced back after introducing major aerodynamic changes to their car at the German Grand Prix last month.
Hamilton's superiority was demonstrated by the fact that he set his fastest lap on his first run in the final qualifying session, on which he was half a second quicker than his closest pursuer.
His rivals closed up on their second and final runs, but Hamilton was on an even faster lap at the end of the session, which he aborted when it became clear no-one could beat his time of one minute 39.498 seconds.
Kovalainen was 0.034secs behind him, with Barrichello 0.065secs adrift of the leading McLaren.
"It's a fantastic achievement for the team," Hamilton said.
"Clearly we have very good pace this weekend,. It's been very close between me and Heikki. H has done a fantastic job.
"We stand in the best position going into tomorrow for a podium, but it all depends on strategy and the start and how the rest of the race goes."
Kovalainen is driving a slightly different specification of car here to Hamilton, who has a new shorter wheelbase design, and McLaren say the Finn's car is about 0.2secs slower.


Maybe P5 is better on the cleaner side of the track - but the McLarens are going to be very difficult to beat here



Jenson Button

Kovalainen looked on course to best Hamilton's first time - at which point his team-mate was behind him and still on his hot lap - but he made a mistake at the final corner and lost precious fractions.
"I clearly went over the limit," Kovalainen said. "I could have done a bit better, but had I not pushed I could have dropped three or four places quite easily. Luckily I didn't lose more than one place. It's fine. It's a great place to start for tomorrow."
Barrichello was fastest of all in the second part of qualifying, when the cars are running closest to their ultimate speed - drivers who make it into the top-10 shootout are not allowed to refuel before the race so their pace is dictated by the amount of fuel they have on board for the first part of the grand prix.
The Brazilian said: "It's good to be back and competitive. You never know how much fuel these guys have. I hope I have more than them."
Button said he had made a mistake on his best lap but that he in any case could not have beaten his team-mate.
"I went wide in Turn Four and lost a couple of 10ths but even so it would still only have been P4. Maybe P5 is better on the cleaner side of the track. But the McLarens are going to be very difficult to beat here."
Luca Badoer, standing in at Ferrari for the injured Felipe Massa, had a very poor qualifying.
He was slowest of all in the first session, and the gap between Badoer and the next slowest car, Jaime Alguesuari's Toro Rosso, was bigger than the gap between fastest man Button and Alguesuari in 19th.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/moto...ne/8215731.stm