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Front row locked out

Jenson Button captured his first pole since this event in 2006 to give Ross Brawn and his new team a debut to remember at the 2009 Australian Grand Prix. Rubens Barrichello made it better as he locked out the front row and gave Brawn GP a huge chance to capture a win on debut.

The first qualifying session began with a few surprises as it looked like Fernando Alonso in the Renault and the two McLaren cars had made some ground up on the leaders, however both teams needed late flying laps to stay in qualifying and progress to qualifying two. It was in this session that the Brawn cars stepped up and told the rest of the field it was here to win as Barrichello set the fastest time. The disappointing Force India cars were two of the five cars to drop out as well as both Toro Rosso entries with Sebastien Buemi upstaging Bourdais. Nelson Piquet was the other driver to join them as he continued his mediocre start to an F1 career with a lap that was over half a second slower than team mate Alonso.

Qualifying session number two began with some shocking news – Lewis Hamilton would not take part due to a drive train issue. Not that Jenson Button cared as he set a scorching time early in the session that stood atop the time sheet until team mate Barrichello snatched it away late. Home town hero Mark Webber was impressive for Red Bull as he put his car into a promising third, while Timo Glock sat fourth. Heikki Kovalainen ended a disastrous day for McLaren as he could only muster 14th, while noted qualifying struggler Kazuki Nakajima could only muster 13th compared to his high flying team mate. Fernando Alonso showed how much the Renault is struggling when he speared off the track at turn 15 trying desperately to make time. Surprisingly the last car to join them on the outer was Nick Heidfeld who had looked fast in the previous session with his BMW Sauber.

If it wasn’t evident enough in the first two sessions, the third session showed how much dominance Brawn GP has over the field as they locked out the front row with ease, scorching the track to be three tenths faster than Sebastian Vettel. His team mate Mark Webber was on a decent lap to join him on the second row, but made a mistake to finish an incredibly disappointing tenth. Robert Kubica put the woes of his team mate out the way as he put his BMW into a surprising fourth, while Rosberg lacked the pace of earlier in the day to only come in fifth. Glock easily beat team mate Trulli in the Toyota to finish sixth and eighth respectively, while Massa and Raikkonen rounded out the top ten in seventh and ninth.

So heading into the race on Sunday it almost looks like a walk in the park for the two Brawn GP entries, but we know Albert Park throws up safety cars and accidents, so strategy could come into play as well as reliability. Sit back, relax and enjoy the race here on UpdateF1 tomorrow.

Written: Sat, 28 Mar 2009 07:25:37