Massa pips Alonso in Spanish qualifying

F1 Grand Prix, GP Spain, Circuit de Catalunya

Felipe Massa will start from pole position in the 2007 Spanish Grand Prix Formula One. Home driver Alonso is second and just 0.030 seconds behind the pole sitter. Kimi Raikkonen is third while Hamilton is in fourth position.

The Spanish qualifying looks set to be competitive and possibly surprising. During the final practice session McLaren was leading ahead of BMW and followed by Ferrari. There has been much to do about the cooling updates at Ferrari, but early on in the weekend there were hardly any signs of improved pace compared to BMW or McLaren. All important updates will of course appear in the development blog in F1technical during the weekend.

Trulli is the first to go on track and is immediately out for 2 flying laps on the hard tyre compound. The Spanish track is notoriously known for its abrasive tarmac surface and we may expect a very short lifetime of the medium compound. The latter are recognisable by the white line as these are considered to be the "option tyre" during the Spanish GP.

Scott Speed's qualifying immediately came to an end as "his engine was dying" during his very first lap. He slowly came back into the pitlane and never came out again. Christijan Albers meanwhile visited the gravel trap while already being under a lot of pressure for his insufficient pace. At the end of Q1, Ralf Schumacher, Wurz, Webber, Sutil, Albers and Speed are out of the game.

After Q2, Rosberg is just out of the top 10 together with both Honda cars, Liuzzi and the Super Aguris. David Coulthard is at that time the fastest behind the three top teams and proves the improved Red Bull pace. Both Renaults are notable also in the super pole, a little success for the troubled French team.

Apart from BMW, all drivers put on the medium compound for their first flying laps. Alonso herein proved to be the fastest after beating Raikkonen's Ferrari with as much as 0.45 seconds. During the second string only Massa was able to beat Alonso's time and it was good for yet another Ferrari pole position. World champion Alonso stranded on 0.030 seconds.