Vettel snatches pole at the death
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Sebastian Vettel left it until the last possible moment to snatch pole position from Lewis Hamilton in a dramatic qualifying session ahead of the Malaysian Grand Prix.
The reigning world champion pipped McLaren's Hamilton by 0.114secs, in stark contrast to the near 0.8secs advantage he enjoyed around Melbourne's Albert Park.
But as in Melbourne, it is the same one-two-three line-up with Vettel ahead of Hamilton, then his own team-mate in Mark Webber, with Jenson Button fourth in his McLaren.
Behind the leading quartet, Ferrari's Fernando Alonso starts fifth, with Nick Heidfeld in his Renault sixth, a superb improvement from his 18th in Australia.
Felipe Massa lines up seventh in his Ferrari, followed by the second Renault of Vitaly Petrov, Nico Rosberg in his Mercedes and Sauber's Kamui Kobayashi.
It proved to be a dramatic end to the middle 15-minute qualifying stint because, with the clock beyond zero, on his final flying lap Rosberg dumped team-mate Michael Schumacher out of Q3. For the second successive race the seven-times champion will start from 11th on the grid, finishing almost 0.7secs adrift of his fellow German.
Behind Schumacher will be Sebastien Buemi, who endured a scare in the initial 20-minute session when a piece of bodywork flew off his Toro Rosso. With the left-hand sidepod lying on the track, the session was red flagged in order for a marshal to run on and retrieve it, causing a four-minute delay.
Team-mate Jaime Alguersuari starts one place behind in 13th, with Paul di Resta again performing admirably. The Scot will line up 14th in his Force India, more than 0.2secs and three places ahead of team-mate Adrian Sutil who has Williams' Rubens Barrichello and Sergio Perez in his Sauber also ahead of him.
Lotus duo Heikki Kovalainen and Jarno Trulli start 19th and 20th, with Williams' Pastor Maldonado the man to miss out on a place in Q2 by 0.113secs to team-mate Barrichello.
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Virgin Racing pair Timo Glock and Jerome D'Ambrosio line up on the 11th row in 21st and 22nd places with the Hispania Racing duo of Vitantonio Liuzzi and Narain Karthikeyan bringing up the rear.