Sebastian Vettel maintained his extraordinary dominance of Formula One on Saturday by claiming pole position for the Korean Grand Prix.
The German has now taken pole for three straight races and is aiming for a fourth successive win. He's also chasing a hat trick of wins at the Yeongam circuit, and most importantly, a fourth consecutive F1 championship.
Vettel set his pole time early in the final qualifying session, and was able to abort his final flying lap when nearest challenger lewis Hamilton of Mercedes came up two-tenths of a second short in his bid to beat Vettel's time.
"I had a very, very good lap in Q3 at my first attempt, and I knew that would be tricky to beat that time myself," Vettel said. "Fortunately the first lap was good enough," he added. "Mercedes was very strong."
Hamilton had been the fastest in Friday's practice, but Mercedes could not improve the car as much overnight as Red Bull did. Still, Hamilton said he was satisfied with second.
"I felt I got the most out of the car," the British driver said. "In general it's been a good weekend and I really hope tomorrow we can fight with them (Red Bull)."
The positive news for Hamilton, and everyone else who qualified in an even-numbered grid slot, is that the even numbers have the inside line to the first corner, while the odd-numbered places are outside but on the rubbered racing line. last year it was the inside line which won the short sprint to the single-file first corner.
Vettel's teammate Mark Webber qualified in third but carries a ten-grid-place penalty into Sunday's race for hitching a ride back to the pits on Fernando Alonso's Ferrari after the Singapore Grand Prix. He will be demoted to 13th.