The final phase of qualifying for the Spanish Grand Prix will have a familiar look about it, following the failure of either
Williams or Honda to get a car into the top ten in phase two.
As expected, the battle to make the top ten shoot-out was closely fought, although perhaps not as frenetic as many expected. Unfortunately for
Honda,
Rubens Barrichello, who had been seventh for much of the 15-minute phase, dropped to eleventh in the flurry of changes that came in the final moments, while
Jenson Button, who'd been thwarted by traffic first time around, could not muster the pace to better twelfth on his final run.
The Briton was then bumped back to 13th in the final order as
Kazuki Nakajima improved in the best of the Williams-Toyotas, but the Japanese rookie was also unable to find the speed to make the cut, joining team-mate
Nico Rosberg in the drop zone.
Toyota also lost one of its two 'works' cars as
Timo Glock managed only 14th, while
Sebastien Bourdais, having made Q2, made a couple of errors on his final lap and settled for 16th.
Ferrari again headed the session, this time with
Felipe Massa, who leapt from inside the bottom six straight to P1, deposing
Robert Kubica, who again underlined
BMW Sauber's pace.
Kimi Raikkonen,
Fernando Alonso and
Nick Heidfeld completed the top five as
McLaren kept its powder dry with
Lewis Hamilton and
Heikki Kovalainen ahead of Q3.
Nelson Piquet Jr,
Jarno Trulli and
Mark Webber complete the shoot-out line-up.
