Sebastian Vettel on pole in India as Red Bull claim a hat-trick of front-row lockouts

They've done it again. Sebastian Vettel will start the Indian GP from pole position after Red Bull claimed their third successive front-row lockout.

Having made that rarest of things - a mistake - on his first flying lap during an unexpectedly tense top-ten shoot-out, the World Champion made amends as the chequered flag fell to edge out team-mate Mark Webber by less than a tenth of a second and claim the 35th pole of a career that has still yet to reach the 100-race landmark.
Yet if the narrow margin of Vettel's advantage was a surprise given that the reigning World Champion had topped each of the three practice sessions in the build-up to qualifying, the shock was that McLaren clawed their way so close to the seemingly-invincible Red Bulls as the team mounted a gutsy comeback from their Friday slumbers.
Hamilton, in particular, deserves considerable praise. Still fully committed to the cause, and wringing every ounce of speed out of a McLaren car which has steadily gained in pace as the weekend has progressed, the Mercedes-bound charger finally pipped Jenson Button in the final throes to end up in third, just two-tenths adrift of Vettel. Performances in adversity are impossible to measure accurately, but Hamilton's effort may well have been one of the laps of the season.
"It was tight," noted Sky Sports F1's Damon Hill of Red Bull's slender advantage. "It wasn't a totally dominant performance. They really had to work for that."
Such is the apparent state of play in F1 at present that such small mercies are so gratefully received. Nonetheless, given the evident impressive race-trim pace of Hamilton's McLaren in Friday practice, it isn't merely wishful thinking to suspect that Red Bull won't necessarily have it all their own way in Sunday's grand prix.
"The team have done a great job to dial in the car," confirmed Hamilton. "We can definite challenge these guys because our race pace was definitely just as quick as theirs on Friday."
 
We'll see, but Fernando Alonso will certainly hope that Hamilton and Button can mount a challenge to Vettel. It almost goes without typing that the Spaniard extracted everything out of his Ferrari to claim fifth on the grid, although, for once, it could be argued that Felipe Massa was the most impressive Ferrari driver on view.
The Brazilian was certainly the pluckiest. Having struggled to master the Buddh International Circuit last year, Massa, whose F2012 hasn't been rearmed with the new parts that have been bolted on to Alonso's in an urgent bid to stem the Red Bull tide, has been in a literal spin for most of this weekend as well, his car slithering and slithering all over the track and frequently off it too.
But, gamely sticking to his task during a qualifying session which also saw him take a leery spin in the opening minutes, Felipe snuck up through the field to deliver a lap that will see him line up sixth on the grid.
Just don't expect him to challenge the title-chasing Alonso. Such is the dutiful nature of his position at Ferrari, Massa was reduced to offering his team-mate a tow along the back-straight during the qualifying hour - although the ploy was abandoned, to general relief, in the last of qualy's three segments.
Underlined by the Noah's Ark nature of the grid - two Red Bulls followed by two McLarens and then two Ferraris - the season has assumed a familiar pattern with the superior resources of the three behemoths leaving the rest of the field to trail in their distant wake.
Having promised so much, the sense that Lotus drifting towards the midfield was summed up by Romain Grosjean failing to reach the top-ten shoot-out and Kimi Raikkonen, who still stands third in the World Championship standings, making no discernible error but still only qualifying seventh.
For Force India, Paul di Resta recorded his worst qualifying result in over a year as he ended up just 17th in a car which looked a troublesome handful throughout. Conversely, Bruno Senna has appeared competitive all weekend but, when it mattered most, his day turned flat and he exited at the Qualy Two stage with a lap only worth 13th on the grid. The likeable Brazilian will surely need better to retain his seat for next season.
Team-mate Pastor Maldonado also could have done better, a mistake at the final corner denying the South American a chance to challenge the established order. Yet at least the Venezuelan, courtesy of his last-gasp Qualy One effort, knows what it is like to finish in first place at the end of a timed session around the Buddh circuit this year. But for Maldonado's unexpected surge, Vettel would still, two-thirds through the weekend, be in line to claim what would surely be an unprecedented clean sweep of fastest times and first places.
Nonetheless, having finished Practices One, Two, Three on top, don't put it past the German from following pole position with the fastest lap and victory.
In fact, for all the hope of a sustained challenge from McLaren and Hamilton, it may be wise to half expect it.
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