Felipe Massa takes pole in Austria!

Felipe Massa is on pole for the Austrian Grand Prix after setting the fastest lap of qualifying with just seconds remaining in the third and final session.

Williams’ teammate Valtteri Bottas, who occupied provisional pole position for much of the third session, qualified in second handing Williams Martini Racing their first front row lock-out of the season and becoming the first team to beat Mercedes to pole position in 2014.

Mercedes Nico Rosberg was best of the rest, starting in third place for tomorrow whilst teammate Lewis Hamilton will start from ninth after a disallowed lap and a spin in Q3.
Alonso starts from fourth for Ferrari with Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo just behind in fifth. Magnussen, Kvyat, Raikkonen, Hamilton and Hulkenberg make up the final top ten.

As Qualifying got underway in Austria, it was the Toro Rosso’s of Daniil Kvyat and Jean-Eric Vergne who set the initial pace before quickly being knocked down the grid as the short lap helped drivers’ set their first flying laps in quick succession. By the time Hamilton had set his first lap, Kvyat found himself a full second off the pace at the front of the grid.

The majority of drivers started the day on the slower soft compound with only the back markers of Marussia, Caterham and Sauber heading out early on the super-soft tyre. Mercedes, who set the early pace with teammates Hamilton and Rosberg occupying first two provisional places on the grid, rolled their cars back into the garage with seven minutes still remaining in the session, having achieved what they wanted and looking to save tyres and running time.

Despite being on their home track, Red Bull Racing struggled with lap times and both Ricciardo and Vettel found themselves with work to do at the end of Q1 if wanting to make it to the third and final qualifying session. Lotus’ struggles also continue in Austria – Grosjean had to run an early lap in Q1 on the super-soft compound to get out of the drop-out zone, whilst Maldonado spend almost the entire session in the drop-out zone before moving up with just minutes to go.

Q1 posed to be another disaster qualifying session for the Sauber team. Both Sutil and Gutierrez dropped out at Q1, qualifying 17th and 18th with the Marussia of Jules Bianchi just behind. Caterham’s Kamui Kobayashi qualified ahead of Max Chilton and Magnus Ericsson, but Max Chilton’s five place grid penalty means the Marussia will start the race from the back of the grid tomorrow.

Q2 started with a flurry as the first eight drivers to take to the track did so on the super-soft compound, looking to lay a fast lap early in the session with the track being pushed to the limit as the battle for pole position intensified. Force India’s Hulkenberg set the initial pace, before McLaren’s Kevin Magnussen set the fastest lap. He would then be moved down the grid by the Williams’ dup of Bottas and Massa, before finally Mercedes’ Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton moved back to the front of the pack.

The surprise of the Q2 dropouts came to the sound of Red Bull Racing and Sebastian Vettel, who was unable to match the pace of teammate Daniel Ricciardo and could only qualify in 13th place. Force India’s Sergio Perez and McLaren’s Jenson Button also dropped out after qualifying ahead of Vettel, but a five place grid penalty for Sergio Perez will move Vettel ahead into 12th and Button into 11th. Maldonado, Vergne and Grosjean also dropped out at the end of Q2, but will move one place forward as Perez moved back into 16th.

Rosberg, Hamilton, Bottas, Massa, Alonso and Ricciardo went into the third and final qualifying session with two sets of super-soft tyres to their disposal whilst Magnussen, Kvyat, Hulkenberg and Raikkonen only had one set. This set the tone for a fast paced final session as those with only one set of super-softs would try to avoid having to run on used rubber.

The first two minutes of Q3 went by without any action on track, before Magnussen and Alonso set out to start the fight for pole position. It would be the Williams of Bottas who would set the early pace though, putting the benchmark at 1:08.846 with teammate Felipe Massa slotting in just behind.

Hamilton’s first fast lap of Q3 was disallowed after running wide and all four tyres moved out of the white lines of the track when running wide in the final turns of the circuit whilst Rosberg’s first fast lap of the final session was not fast enough to move ahead of Bottas who remained in provisional pole position.

As per usual, the fight for pole position came down to the dying seconds of qualifying, leaving the top ten runners to post just on final fast lap to secure their positions for tomorrow’s Grand Prix. Valtteri Bottas’ final attempt would not improve on his fastest lap time, running wide and clipping the grass whilst Mercedes Lewis Hamilton would spin the car and will start from ninth on the grid tomorrow after not being able to post a fast lap.

Felipe Massa would prove to be the star of the afternoon though, sweeping in at the last moment and taking pole position from his teammate. As a result, Felipe Massa won his first pole position since his crash in 2009, leading the Williams Martini Racing team to their first one-two qualifying of the 2014 season. It is also the first time Mercedes AMG F1 has been beaten to pole position in 2014.

The Formula 1 Grosser Preis Von Osterreich 2014 starts tomorrow, Sunday June 22nd, at 14:00 local time.