‘I own this track',
Felipe Massa had vowed on Friday in Turkey, and the Brazilian would prove as good as his word in qualifying around the challenging Istanbul Park circuit, by storming to his second pole position of the 2008 campaign ahead of an impressive
Heikki Kovalainen.
Indeed, McLaren-Mercedes' resurgence seemed to continue apace this weekend, with
Lewis Hamilton lining up just behind his team-mate in third, defending world champion
Kimi Raikkonen just fourth and the BMW-Saubers of
Robert Kubica and
Nick Heidfeld a relatively low-key fifth and ninth respectively.
With one big name certain to face the chop at the end of Q1 following
Super Aguri's demise, the qualifying session across the Bosphorus promised to be a high-pressure affair indeed.
Force India's
Giancarlo Fisichella was the first man to take to the track on the harder of
Bridgestone's two specifications of tyre, though with the Italian having to take a three-place grid penalty for crossing through a red light at the end of the pit lane during Friday practice, barring some kind of mega effort his battle to escape the drop zone looked to be more of a forlorn conclusion than ever.
Timo Glock,
Sebastian Vettel,
Kazuki Nakajima and Fisichella's team-mate
Adrian Sutil were the next drivers to put in an appearance, with the German
Toyota ace completing two laps on his first run, and to good effect with a strong opening lap.
The big guns were not long to show their hands, with Finns Kovalainen and Raikkonen followed onto the circuit by Hamilton. The trio immediately leapt to the top of the timing screens, the Briton half a second clear of his team-mate, himself three hundredths of a second ahead of his countryman with Massa just fourth.
