Webber beats Vettel to Abu Dhabi pole

Mark Webber has secured his second pole position of the 2013 season, just one weekend after his Red Bull Racing team secured their fourth consecutive World Constructors’ Championship and ahead of teammate and four times World Champion Sebastian Vettel.

A perfect lap from the man who will retire from Formula 1 at the end of this season, Mark Webber beat Sebastian Vettel to pole position by a full tenth of a second. Vettel had to settle for second place after being seen shaking his head in the cockpit as Q3 came to a close in the dark of the Abu Dhabi Saturday night.

Mercedes’ Nico Rosberg, who looked strong in the early stages of qualifying finished in P3 whilst teammate Lewis Hamilton will start alongside in fourth. Hamilton, who also looked strong for a front row finish to qualifying, failed to move higher than fourth after spinning his car off track on his final lap of the session in the dying minutes.

Kimi Raikkonen will start from fifth tomorrow with Sauber’s Nico Hulkenberg in sixth. Hulkenberg, who is still without a confirmed drive for the 2014 season, continues to impress on track in both qualifying and race situations.

Romain Grosjean, Felipe Massa, Sergio Perez and Daniel Ricciardo make up the final of the top ten qualifiers in a session that saw both Felipe Massa and Sergio Perez out qualify their World Champion teammates once again.

With little on track excitement throughout the entire hours’ session, Q2 proved to be the most interesting of sessions this evening with a handful of surprise dropouts.

Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso failed to make Q3 for the first time in the 2013 season and will start from P11 for tomorrows Grand Prix. Paul di Resta is just behind in P12 as the Scottish drivers’ qualifying frustrations continue, and McLaren’s Jenson Button also continues to struggle. Button lacked pace throughout all three practice sessions and qualifying, and will start tomorrow from thirteenth.

Toro Rosso’s Jean-Eric Vergne starts from P14 with the Williams F1 duo of Pastor Maldonado and Valtteri Bottas lining up together in fifteenth and sixteenth respectively.

Esteban Gutierrez failed to make Q2 for Sauber and will start from P17 for tomorrow’s race with Force India’s Adrian Sutil starting just behind in eighteenth. Caterham’s Giedo van der Garde will start from P19 after proving himself once again to be quicker than teammate Charles Pic and edging out both rival team cars of Marussia.

Jules Bianchi was handed a five place grid penalty after the team had to change his gearbox before qualifying. The change was needed after Bianchi crashed his car in the third practice session of the weekend earlier today. This had little effect on the grid though as Bianchi qualified in P20 or meaning he will start the race from the back of the grid in P22. Van der Garde and Bianchi are split by teammates Charles Pic and Max Chilton.

Full qualifying times and results can be found below. The 2013 Formula 1 Etihad Airways Abu Dhabi Grand Prix starts tomorrow, Sunday November 3rd at 17:00 local time.