Webber secures pole position for Spanish GP

Red Bull Racing continued their unrivalled domination of qualifying this season as they locked out the front row for the third time in five Grands Prix.

When it comes to the single-lap showdown on Saturdays, the Milton Keynes-based marquee are currently in a league of their own, with Mark Webber edging out Sebastian Vettel on this occasion.

Webber's third pole lap of his career was timed at one minute 19.995seconds, a brutal performance from the Australian because, even though Vettel was in close attendance, he was almost a second ahead of Lewis Hamilton in third in his McLaren.

History is now on Webber's side as the last nine winners of this race at Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya, and 12 of the last 13, have started from pole.

In front of his adoring fans, Ferrari's Fernando Alonso will start fourth, splitting the McLaren duo as reigning champion and current title leader Jenson Button was fifth.

Alonso, though, caused Mercedes' Nico Rosberg an anxious moment as he cut the German up in the pit lane.

The 28-year-old from Oviedo shot out of his garage for his opening run in Q3, forcing Rosberg to brake sharply and prompt an immediate retort over the team radio as he snapped: "Alonso should get a penalty for that."

Behind Button, and for the first time this season, a much happier Michael Schumacher finally managed to out-qualify team-mate Rosberg.

The seven-time champion, today fined £7,200 for two separate incidents of speeding in the pit line during practice, starts sixth compared to Rosberg's eighth, with Renault's Robert Kubica separating the duo.

Ferrari's Felipe Massa was ninth, with Sauber's Kamui Kobayashi breaking into the top 10 for the second time this season, and on merit as the previous occasion was in the rain-hit chaos in Malaysia.

Rosberg, apparently struggling to find the correct set-up with his car, had only just scraped into Q3, edging out Adrian Sutil by a tenth of a second, leaving the Force India driver to start 11th.

Pedro de la Rosa equalled his best qualifying performance with 12th for Sauber, with the Spaniard ahead of Williams' Nico Hulkenberg and Vitaly Petrov for Renault.

However, in a rapidly-rebuilt car following an accident in final practice earlier today, Petrov will drop five grid places to 19th due to requiring a gearbox change.

The Toro Rossos of Sebastien Buemi and Jaime Alguersuari qualified 15th and 16th and the second Force India of Vitantonio Liuzzi 17th, but they will all move up a place tomorrow courtesy of Petrov.

For the first time this season Rubens Barrichello failed to make it out of Q1, a major surprise as he had been targeting a place in the top 10, as achieved on two previous occasions this season.

Below the 37-year-old Brazilian were the much-improved Lotus duo of Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen, followed by the Virgin Racing pair of Timo Glock and Lucas di Grassi.

At the rear, and on home soil, came Murcia-based Hispania Racing, with Karun Chandhok comfortably ahead of team-mate Bruno Senna.

However, due to a technical infringement, Glock and di Grassi will start at the back of the grid - probably even the pit lane if they so decide - after incurring five-place penalties.

Webber said: "Normally it's always a good battle in qualifying between me and Seb, who has a very good record against me.

"It's usually tight, but it's nice when you get it altogether and get a good result.

"Today is my day, but there are no points for today, although it's a nice situation to try and build from.

"The guys, on both sides of the garage, have had five hours sleep the last two nights, so they've worked incredibly hard which is paying off.

"(Team principal) Christian (Horner) said you won't get to drive a car like this around here too often, so go and enjoy it, and I did."

Asked if he could change history given the pole record at this track, Vettel succinctly replied: "Yes."

He then added: "Congratulations to Mark. He was unbeatable today.

"I had some good laps in qualifying, especially at the end, and although a tenth (of a second) is not much of a gap, it was too much for me.

"Right now it looks comfortable, but we know how quickly it can change."

As for Hamilton, he looked as surprised as anybody at how quick Red Bull are these days.

"I don't think anybody expected them to be so fast," said Hamilton.

"We knew they would be quick, but that is quite a gap. At least we are there and we can fight."