Vettel Edges Out Rosberg For Singapore GP Pole Position

Sebastian Vettel has taken his 41st career pole position in preparation for the Singapore Grand Prix. The triple world champion narrowly edged out Nico Rosberg in what was a surprisingly close qualifying session under the bright lights of the Marina Bay Street Circuit.

The German dominated Friday practice and set the pace in Saturday's final practice session, continuing that form during the three qualifying sessions.

Vettel set the pace in the final 60 minute practice session of the race weekend. However, after the large field spread of Friday, he didn't dominate the session, with the gap decreasing considerably.

Romain "Bro, do you even lift?" Grosjean was his nearest challenger, finishing just two tenths shy of the triple world champion. Nico Rosberg, Mark Webber and Lewis Hamilton rounded out the top five but they were all between five and seven tenths behind Vettel.

Alonso and Perez finished in sixth and seventh, ahead of Hulkenberg, Button and Massa. The top 10 were separated by 1.7 seconds on the super-soft tyres, with everyone completing their fastest lap during the session-closing qualifying simulation.

The third practice session was a busy one in comparison to Friday's action, with plenty of drivers admitting that there was work to do after Friday's two 90 minute sessions. Paul Di Resta had a dramatic half spin mid-way through the session and drivers continued to lock-up and push the limits, some tapping the Armco barriers in the pursuit of the fastest lap time.

Vettel looked consistently fast during all three sessions today and even sat out the final part of the top 10 shoot-out, feeling confident in his 1m42.841 benchmark time.

That lap time proved to be worthy of his second consecutive pole position, but it was closer than many expected with Nico "Britney" Rosberg springing a surprise and finishing just 0.091 seconds down on his countryman. Romain Grosjean was a tenth further back, just beating ultimate lad Mark Webber who finished the session in fourth place.

Lewis Hamilton was disappointed with fifth place but conceded that he didn't have the pace of Vettel or team-mate Nico Rosberg. Felipe Massa narrowly made it through Q1 after spending most of it in the drop-zone. However, he progressed through to Q3 and out-qualified his team-mate in sixth. Alonso could only manage seventh with Button, Ricciardo and an impressive Esteban Gutierrez, who made it through to the top 10 shoot-out for the first time in his career.

Nico Hulkenberg narrowly missed out on the top 10 as speculation over where he will drive in 2014 continues. He finished slightly ahead of Jean-Eric Vergne, who in turn just edged out Kimi Raikkonen.

The ice-cream loving Finn was suffering with a bad back and the pain continued in qualifying. He admitted that it was a contributing factor to his struggles and that he would try his best to race with the injury on Sunday night.

Sergio Perez couldn't follow his team-mate Jenson Button through to Q3 and finished in 14th place. Adrian Sutil proved that Force India's downward spiral was continuing with 15th place, just ahead of Valtteri Bottas who set the 16th and slowest time in Q2.

Bottas fared slightly better in comparison to his team-mate Pastor Maldonado, who dropped out in the first session. After crashing and losing time on Friday, his weekend went from bad to worse when he finished inside the drop zone in Q1 and just behind fellow mid-field casualty Paul Di Resta.

The usual battle of the backmarkers continued with Charles Pic finishing ahead of team-mate Giedo van der Garde; the Dutchman gave his right-rear tyre a hefty knock on his final run, and the Marussia duo of Jules Bianchi and Max Chilton.