Australia 2012 - Qualifying results - Lewis Hamilton takes the first pole position of the year

Published 17 March 2012 by Christine

Australia never fails to to impress when it comes to surprising results, and qualifying delivered on every level. Kimi Räikkönen dropped out in the first session, whilst his teammate made it all the way up to third place. The Toro Rosso drivers split sessions with one in tenth and one in eleventh. McLaren led the way with a 1-2, a great result for those who enjoy the smoother nosed cars. Sebastian Vettel, defending champion, qualified sixth, behind teammate Mark Webber. Finally, and not unexpectedly, both HRT cars failed to reach the 107% cutoff time.

Position	Driver	Team	Time	Laps
1	Lewis Hamilton	Vodafone McLaren Mercedes	1:24.922	14
2	Jenson Button	Vodafone McLaren Mercedes	1:25.074	15
3	Romain Grosjean	Lotus F1 Team	1:25.302	21
4	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team	1:25.336	18
5	Mark Webber	Red Bull Racing	1:25.651	17
6	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull Racing	1:25.668	18
7	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team	1:25.686	16
8	Pastor Maldonado	Williams F1 Team	1:25.908	20
9	Nico Hülkenberg	Sahara Force India F1 Team	1:26.451	18
10	Daniel Ricciardo	Scuderia Toro Rosso	No Time	16
11	Jean-Éric Vergne	Scuderia Toro Rosso	1:26.429	12
12	Fernando Alonso	Scuderia Ferrari	1:26.494	12
13	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber F1 Team	1:26.590	12
14	Bruno Senna	Williams F1 Team	1:26.663	16
15	Paul di Resta	Sahara Force India F1 Team	1:27.086	16
16	Felipe Massa	Scuderia Ferrari	1:27.497	16
17	Sergio Pérez	Sauber F1 Team	No Time	11
18	Kimi Räikkönen	Lotus F1 Team	1:27.758	9
19	Heikki Kovalainen	Caterham F1 Team	1:28.379	7
20	Vitaly Petrov	Caterham F1 Team	1:29.018	8
21	Timo Glock	Marussia F1 Team	1:30.923	10
22	Charles Pic	Marussia F1 Team	1:31.670	9
DNQ	Pedro de la Rosa	HRT Formula 1 Team	1:33.495	6
DNQ	Narain Karthikeyan	HRT Formula 1 Team	1:33.643	6

107% time: 1:32.214