Sebastian Vettel made dead sure of taking a record 15th pole position when he took to the track with less than two minutes left in the final segment of qualifying for the Brazilian Grand Prix at the Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace circuit in Sao Paulo on Saturday. His 1min11.918sec lap was just 0.181 seconds faster than that of his Red Bull Racing teammate Mark Webber who managed to bump Jenson Button's McLaren on to the second row of the grid in the dying seconds of the session.
Button is joined on the second row by the Abu Dhabi GP winner Lewis Hamilton who will start fourth ahead of Ferrari's Fernando Alonso. Nico Rosberg lines up on the grid behind Alonso after managing to outqualify the second Ferrari of Felipe Massa who will start ahead of Force India's Adrian Sutil, Renault's Bruno Senna and Michael Schumacher's Mercedes GP car.
Vettel's pole position betters the single season mark set by Nigel Mansell in 1992 when the Briton started at the front of the grid 14 times en route to winning the drivers' championship. Mansell's 14 poles were, however, set over the course of 16 races while Vettel's 15th pole comes in the 19th race of a very long season. Should Vettel win today's race, then he will fall one race shy of the single season record for wins set by Schumacher in 2004.
{{/usCountry}}Vettel's pole position betters the single season mark set by Nigel Mansell in 1992 when the Briton started at the front of the grid 14 times en route to winning the drivers' championship. Mansell's 14 poles were, however, set over the course of 16 races while Vettel's 15th pole comes in the 19th race of a very long season. Should Vettel win today's race, then he will fall one race shy of the single season record for wins set by Schumacher in 2004.
{{/usCountry}}Schumacher was the only one of the ten drivers in the final segment of qualifying to not set a time.