Webber beats Vettel to pole in Abu Dhabi

The Australian put together three near-perfect sectors on his final Q3 run to record a lap that was just over a tenth of a second quicker than Vettel’s best effort. Mercedes’ Nico Rosberg was third, with team mate Lewis Hamilton spinning as he tried to improve on fourth.

Q1 was a bit of a cliffhanger as lots of drivers made late improvements as they switched to Pirelli’s soft tyres and the times changed with machine-gun rapidity. As the chequered flag fell Hamilton was 17th, then 18th, but he was out on a quick lap and when he finally crossed the line he stopped the clocks in 1m 40.693s, more than half a second up on former pacesetter, Ferrari's Felipe Massa, so the six who failed to go through were Sauber’s Esteban Gutierrez, who ran too soon for his 1m 41.999s, Adrian Sutil on 1m 42.051s in his Force India, then the Caterhams and the Marussias. Again Giedo van der Garde was fastest of this quartet on 1m 43.252s ahead of Marussia’s Jules Bianchi on 1m 43.398s and team mate Charles Pic on 1m 43.528s, with the second Marussia of Max Chilton 22nd on 1m 44.198s. However, Bianchi has a five-place grid penalty after changing his gearbox following his accident in FP3.

Q2 was massively bad news for Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso, who failed to better either 1m 41.093s or his team mate Massa’s time and failed to get through to Q3 for the first time this season. The Brazilian just got through in 10th place with 1m 40.989s as Rosberg headed the session with 1m 40.473s, four-thousandths ahead of Hamilton.

Behind Alonso, Paul di Resta was 12th for Force India with 1m 41.133s, then came Jenson Button’s McLaren on 1m 41.200s, Jean-Eric Vergne’s Toro Rosso on 1m 41.279s and the Williams duo of Pastor Maldonado and Valtteri Bottas on 1m 41.395s and 1m 41.447s.

Hamilton, on 1m 40.510s, then Rosberg on 1m 40.419s set the initial pace in Q3 as Webber’s 1m 40.759s first effort yielded only third place, but when Vettel went four-tenths faster than either Mercedes with 1m 40.091s the issue seemed settled.

But then the second runs saw Webber slash his time down to 1m 39.957s, and Vettel come up short with 1m 40.075s as the tables were turned. Meanwhile, Rosberg failed to better his first-run time and Hamilton spun at Turn 14 on his second run, leaving the Mercedes to occupy the second row.

Behind them, Kimi Raikkonen hauled his Lotus to fifth with 1m 40.542s just ahead of the again-impressive Sauber of Nico Hulkenberg on 1m 40.576s and a slightly disappointing Lotus of Romain Grosjean on 1m 40.997s.

Massa, Ricciardo and McLaren’s Sergio Perez each saved tyres by making only one run, with the Brazilian on 1m 41.015s, the Mexican on 1m 41.068s and the Australian on 1m 41.111s.

With penalties applied, the grid will read: Webber, Vettel; Rosberg, Hamilton; Raikkonen, Hulkenberg; Grosjean, Massa; Perez, Ricciardo; Alonso, di Resta; Button, Vergne; Maldonado, Bottas; Gutierrez, Sutil; Van der Garde, Pic; Chilton, Bianchi.