Advantage Rosberg as the German pips Hamilton for Canada pole

Nico Rosberg defied all odds in Montreal yesterday by beating teammate Lewis Hamilton and consequently taking pole position for Sunday’s Canadian Grand Prix. Hamilton had the edge all weekend over his German teammate but when it mattered the most, Rosberg came out on top, taking his second consecutive pole position of the season.

During his first run, the German lapped the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in 1:14.946 to take provisional pole. In the second run he went marginally better, setting a laptime of 1:14.874 as he waited to see what Lewis Hamilton had in the bag. The Brit had set some stonking laps in the dying moments of qualifying earlier this year but this time he made a minor mistake during his final run, which meant that he had to be content with second place.

Behind the two Mercedes came the Red Bull of Sebastian Vettel who set a storming lap of 1:15.548 to qualify his car on the second row of the grid. The result again proves that the German is a worthy champion and that the criticism he receives is rather unfair.

The Williams of Valtteri Bottas and Felipe Massa will start from fourth and fifth places on the grid respectively, which puts them in prime position to challenge for the podium. However, Massa wouldn’t be particularly pleased to qualify behind teammate Valtteri Bottas as he had set the pace all weekend.

Sixth place on the grid went to the second Red Bull of Daniel Ricciardo. Fernando Alonso qualified in seventh place for the seventh Grand Prix of this season, with the Spaniard again out-qualifying his teammate Kimi Raikkonen, who in turn set a relatively poor lap on his single Q3 run to take 10th on the grid.

Jean Eric Vergne and Jenson Button were the sole representatives of their respective teams in the final leg of qualifying. They start the Montreal race in eighth and ninth respectively.

Earlier in Q2, Nico Hulkenberg was the first to miss out on a top 10 shootout, and was joined by teammate Sergio Perez who qualified in 13th place. Force India have traditionally been strong at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve but struggled throughout this weekend, especially on one lap. However, their promising race simulations in practice means that they have a good chance of finishing in the points.

Kevin Magnussen in the second McLaren was 12th fastest while fellow rookie Daniil Kvyat starts three positions behind him in 15th. Adrian Sutil was also knocked out in Q2, and he will start tomorrow’s race from 16th.

In Q1, Max Chilton outqualified Jules Bianchi for the third time this season and insisted that he could have even made it into Q2 had red flags caused by Pastor Maldonado not brought the session to a premature end.

The two Caterhams of Marcus Ericsson and Kamui Kobayashi will line up in 20th and 21st place ahead of Esteban Gutierrez who didn’t take part in qualifying at all after his Sauber sustained chassis damage in FP3 earlier this morning.

By Rachit Thukral