Brazilian GP: Lewis Hamilton on pole ahead of Jenson Button
Last updated on .From the section Formula 1
Lewis Hamilton led Jenson Button to a McLaren one-two in Brazil qualifying.
Title rivals Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull and Ferrari's Fernando Alonso qualified fourth and eighth. Alonso will start seventh after a penalty for Williams's Pastor Maldonado.
Maldonado missed a weight check and was given his third reprimand of 2012 which triggers a 10-place grid drop to 16th.
Alonso is 13 points behind Vettel and must finish on the podium to have any chance of overhauling the German.
Red Bull's Mark Webber was third, with Ferrari's Felipe Massa fifth and out-qualifying team-mate Alonso for the second race in a row.
It was a tight battle for pole between Hamilton and Button, who missed out by just 0.055 seconds.
"I'm grateful to be able to put the car on the front row and to have had my last qualifying with McLaren as a one-two," said Hamilton. "It is a fantastic job by the team and I hope we can turn it into something positive tomorrow."
Alonso has been unconvincing all weekend - he has been slower than Massa.
However, there is a suspicion that the Spaniard compromised his ultimate dry-weather pace to set up his car to favour the wet conditions that are expected in the race.
His engineer Andrea Stella said over the team radio: "We know the situation is good for tomorrow."
Asked if he had made any changes to the set-up in anticipation of a wet race, Alonso said: "No not really. I think in these days the wet or dry set-up is dominated by the aerodynamics, so you can change the level of downforce.
"But here you run with the maximum downforce already in the dry so in the wet it is no big change. I don't think anyone gambled today hoping for tomorrow rain or anything like that and [it was the] same for us."
To win the championship, Alonso must win with Vettel lower than fourth, be second with Vettel lower than seventh or be third with the Red Bull driver below ninth.
There are 25 points for a race win, 18 for second, 15 for third, 12 for fourth, 10 for fifth, eight for sixth, six for seventh, four for eighth, two for ninth, one for tenth.
Vettel was 0.179 seconds slower than Webber and said he was "disappointed", adding: "I need to look at the data and see where I wasn't quick enough."
Alonso will line up one place ahead of Force India's Nico Hulkenberg. The German has now out-qualified team-mate Paul di Resta for five races in a row.
Di Resta was 11th, 0.417secs behind Hulkenberg in second qualifying, which the Scot did not progress beyond.
Michael Schumacher's final qualifying did not go well - he was only 14th, 0.486secs slower than team-mate Nico Rosberg in the second session, which Schumacher did not progress beyond.
Schumacher said he had set the car up in anticipation of a wet race on Sunday.
Alonso may well have been even further from the front had Lotus driver Romain Grosjean not failed to make it beyond the first knock-out session.
The Frenchman collided with the back of Pedro de la Rosa's HRT and broke his front wing.
The Frenchman had time to do one more lap after fitting a new wing and although he briefly made it into 17th place, Toro Rosso's Daniel Ricciardo then beat him by 0.223 seconds.
Final Qualifying top 10
1. Lewis Hamilton - McLaren 1:12.458
2. Jenson Button - McLaren +0.055
3. Mark Webber - Red Bull +0.123
4. Sebastian Vettel - Red Bull +0.302
5. Felipe Massa - Ferrari +0.529
6. Pastor Maldonado - Williams +0.716
7. Nico Hulkenberg - Force India +0.748
8. Fernando Alonso - Ferrari +0.795
9. Kimi Raikkonen - Lotus +0.840
10. Nico Rosberg - Mercedes +1.031
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McLaren are going to miss Lewis' speed next year, he's been different class this year just without the luck at times, hopefully Ross Brawn and co. can produce a car for him in the coming seasons that his immense talent deserves.
Qualifying stats you absolutely will not be hearing about from the BBC under any circumstances..
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Interesting, your statistics prove Jenson is the better driver! As despite poor qualifying he still matches Lewis in the races - no points for qualifying!
For the record. I do not think Jenson is better than Lewis, I was just showing your statistics are meaningless nonsense.
A real darn shame this winning trend was so badly damaged throughout the season by crippling team failures.
A similar situation to the 2008 Brazil race would be nice; unpredictable weather, the title constantly changing hands and a bit of last-corner drama. I'd prefer Alonso, but whoever takes it deserves it. Shame it can't be Kimi!
You don't get points for piruets, talk, artistic impression... Whoever wins the DWC, will be crowned the best driver of the season.
I agree with you Hamilton is braver than Button and never gives up a place and that is why Hamilton leaves McLaren beating Jenson 2-1 despite being let down by his team way more than Jenson.
Also I don't know if you were watching the same race as me but Hamilton did not fight the Hulk and gave him plenty of room, the Hulk was way too hot headed.
JB will be buying him a drink.
it s 2-1 to LH Hobo.
on the incident, LH did give away the spot hobo, ofc u will have ur baised and i will have mine but watch the replay again, he gave him the space but hurk was slidding to much as he came into the corner with a lot of speed too eager to pass
Wow, fabulous piece of investigative journalism, hope you dont fall foul of Levenson.
Real big thanks from all of us F1 fans for revealing those deeply guarded secrets - we could never have found them on wiki or f1.com on our own.
You should be proud.
I hope I'm wrong, I would so want JB and LH to end the season on a high and put a bad 12 months (for all intents and purposes) behind them.