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SPORTS: FORMULA 1 - Singapore - Lewis Hamilton: Pole Position (THE SUN)

Saturday, September 22, 2012

FORMULA 1 - Singapore - Lewis Hamilton: Pole Position (THE SUN)


McLaren feast as Ham role is pole

ON SONG IN SING ... Hamilton will start first on grid for Singapore GP
Published: 22nd September 2012
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LEWIS HAMILTON'S third pole in four races further fuelled up his late Formula One world title charge.
The McLaren ace - 37 points and one place behind world championship leader Fernando Alonso - will be joined by Williams gatecrasher Pastor Maldonado on the front row for Sunday's Singapore Grand Prix.

That gave McLaren four poles in a row for the first time since 1999.

Red Bull's Sebastien Vettel, McLaren star Jenson Button and fifth-placed Ferrari driver Alonso trailed in behind Hamilton.

Vettel, who won from pole last year, was the quickest in all three practice sessions but had no answer to Hamilton's lap of one minute 46.362 seconds, with the Briton half a second up on Maldonado.

Force India's Paul Di Resta conjured a superb sixth, with Red Bull's Mark Webber seventh but under investigation and facing a five-place penalty for impeding Marussia's Timo Glock in Q1, whilst Lotus' Romain Grosjean starts eighth.


On the fifth row will be Mercedes' duo Michael Schumacher and Nico Rosberg, neither driver setting a time after using up all three sets of their supersoft tyres in the first two sessions.

Nico Hulkenberg found himself ousted from Q2 at the death by the last man on track in Schumacher, leaving the younger German to start 11th in his Force India.

Another title contender Kimi Raikkonen, third in the standings and 38 points behind Alonso, could only manage 12th in his Lotus, claiming he had no grip from his tyres.

For the ninth time in 14 qualifying sessions this season Felipe Massa failed to make it into the top 10, lining up 13th for Ferrari.

Sauber's Sergio Perez, second just a fortnight ago in Italy, starts 14th ahead of Toro Rosso pair Daniel Ricciardo and Jean-Eric Vergne.

Williams' Bruno Senna will start 17th after he smacked a wall with his right-rear wheel, breaking the suspension and taking no further action in the session.

Just two races after starting on the front row in Belgium, Sauber's Kamui Kobayashi was the big-name scalp who failed to make it out of Q1, blaming a lack of confidence with an over-steering car in which he will line up 18th.

In team order, Caterham's Vitaly Petrov managed to out-qualify Heikki Kovalainen, with the duo starting 19th and 20th.

At Marussia, Glock finished ahead of Charles Pic, who tomorrow will have 20 seconds added to his race time after passing four red lights and overtaking a rival in final practice.

In a unique move the stewards have also ordered Pic to perform a day of community service for the FIA's Action for Road Safety campaign.

On the back row are HRT duo Narain Karthikeyan and Pedro de la Rosa, the latter's five-place penalty for a gearbox change an irrelevance.

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