Hamilton scores pole as tyres dominate Shanghai qualifying

Lewis Hamilton will start Sunday’s Chinese Grand Prix from pole position after emerging fastest from a low-key qualifying session at the Shanghai International Circuit.

Tyre conservation dominated the three-part session from the outset, with the top grid positions eventually decided by just one run in Q3. No driver set a Q3 lap until after the chequered flag fell.

Hamilton’s 1:34.48s effort proved almost 0.3s faster than that of second-placed man Kimi Raikkonen, with Fernando Alonso, Nico Rosberg, Felipe Massa, Romain Grosjean and Daniel Riccardo completing the top seven, all on the soft compound tyre.

Jenson Button was eighth after electing to trundle around on the medium rubber for his Q3 time.

Sebastian Vettel and Nico Hulkenberg will start ninth and 10th respectively after the two Germans elected against setting a time in the final session, meaning that they have free choice of starting tyre compound for the race.

Vettel’s Red Bull team-mate Mark Webber managed just 14th after his RB9 ran out of fuel and stopped on the circuit in Q2.

The Australian will be forced to start from the back of the grid due to the requirement for a one litre fuel sample to be taken from cars post-qualifying.

The team later admitted to a fuel bowser malfunction that saw the Webber leave the pits 3kg short of the intended fuel load.

“Unfortunately in Q2 the amount of fuel that was required to be put into the car from the fuel rig was not fully delivered,” said team boss Christian Horner.

“This was due to an error with the fuel bowser that meant it under delivered 3kg of fuel.

“Therefore on Mark’s in-lap we saw large drop outs in the fuel tank collector and the car unfortunately ran dry of fuel, which is obviously frustrating.

“The fuel bowser has been immediately quarantined for further investigation.”

See below for the full qualifying result

Pos	Driver	Team	Q1	Q2	Q3
1	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:35.793	1:35.078	1:34.484
2	Kimi Räikkönen	Lotus-Renault	1:37.046	1:35.659	1:34.761
3	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	1:36.253	1:35.148	1:34.788
4	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1:35.959	1:35.537	1:34.861
5	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	1:35.972	1:35.403	1:34.933
6	Romain Grosjean	Lotus-Renault	1:36.929	1:36.065	1:35.364
7	Daniel Ricciardo	STR-Ferrari	1:36.993	1:36.258	1:35.998
8	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	1:36.667	1:35.784	2:05.673
9	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull Racing-Renault	1:36.537	1:35.343
10	Nico Hulkenberg	Sauber-Ferrari	1:36.985	1:36.261
11	Paul di Resta	Force India-Mercedes	1:37.478	1:36.287
12	Sergio Perez	McLaren-Mercedes	1:36.952	1:36.314
13	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	1:37.349	1:36.405
14	*Mark Webber	Red Bull Racing-Renault	1:36.148	1:36.679
15	Pastor Maldonado	Williams-Renault	1:37.281	1:37.139
16	Jean-Eric Vergne	STR-Ferrari	1:37.508	1:37.199
17	Valtteri Bottas	Williams-Renault	1:37.769
18	Esteban Gutierrez	Sauber-Ferrari	1:37.990
19	Jules Bianchi	Marussia-Cosworth	1:38.780
20	Max Chilton	Marussia-Cosworth	1:39.537
21	Charles Pic	Caterham-Renault	1:39.614
22	Giedo van der Garde	Caterham-Renault	1:39.660

*Webber will be forced to start from the back of the grid