Not many would have predicted that Mercedes would steal the pole position today in Barcelona F1 Qualifying, but they did.
After FP3 this morning, it looked almost certain that either Ferrari or Lotus would lock out the front row but it was the German Mercedes team that took the honours.
Rosberg delivered two amazing qualifying laps, both good enough to take the pole position. Lewis Hamilton was forced to settle for second place 0.254 seconds adrift of his team mate.
Sebastian Vettel placed his RB9 in third place for Red Bull Racing, followed by the Lotus of Kimi Raikkonen.
Fernando Alonso only managed 5th place at his home qualifying with his team mate Felipe Massa behind him in 6th place. Massa however will have to see the stewards later today for impeding Mark Webber during Q2.
Romain Grosjean put his Lotus in 7th place, ahead of Webber.
The McLaren team are not having the greatest weekend of all. Perez did however manage a last minute surge to qualify 7th but team mate Jenson Button only managed to qualify 14th.
Esteban Gutierrez will be seeing the stewards too after impeding Kimi Raikkonen and Button also complained that he was held up “massively” by Maldonado but both the Massa and Gutierrez incidents seemed far more severe in comparison.
Giedo van der Garde is a very happy man at the back of the grid after qualifying at the front of the bottom four, a triumph for the rookie driver.
Here are the full time sheets for today’s Barcelona F1 Qualifying session:
Pos Driver Team/Car Time Gap
1. Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1m20.718s
2. Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1m20.972s + 0.254s
3. Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault 1m21.054s + 0.336s
4. Kimi Raikkonen Lotus-Renault 1m21.177s + 0.459s
5. Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1m21.218s + 0.500s
6. Felipe Massa Ferrari 1m21.219s + 0.501s
7. Romain Grosjean Lotus-Renault 1m21.308s + 0.590s
8. Mark Webber Red Bull-Renault 1m21.570s + 0.852s
9. Sergio Perez McLaren-Mercedes 1m22.069s + 1.351s
10. Paul di Resta Force India-Mercedes 1m22.233s + 1.515s
11. Daniel Ricciardo Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m22.127s + 1.126s
12. Jean-Eric Vergne Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m22.166s + 1.165s
13. Adrian Sutil Force India-Mercedes 1m22.346s + 1.345s
14. Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes 1m23.166s + 2.165s
15. Nico Hulkenberg Sauber-Ferrari 1m22.389s + 1.388s
16. Esteban Gutierrez Sauber-Ferrari 1m22.793s + 1.792s
17. Valtteri Bottas Williams-Renault 1m23.260s + 1.532s
18. Pastor Maldonado Williams-Renault 1m23.318s + 1.590s
19. Giedo van der Garde Caterham-Renault 1m24.661s + 2.933s
20. Jules Bianchi Marussia-Cosworth 1m24.713s + 2.985s
21. Max Chilton Marussia-Cosworth 1m24.996s + 3.268s
22. Charles Pic Caterham-Renault 1m25.070s + 3.342s
