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2002 Austrian Grand Prix 
Qualifying Session  

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Qualifying Session Report - Results

Rubens Barrichello grabbed his second Pole position of the season in spectacular style by beating last year's pole time by a massive 1.5 seconds and beating his team-mate Michael Schumacher by over 0.6 seconds. That is unheard of.
Ralf Schumacher proved to the world that Williams is still close to Ferrari after managing to split the two Ferraris and Juan Pablo Montoya managed 4th but over a second off the pace after having a bad session and having to jump into the spare car and go through scrutineering.
Nick Heidfeld in the improved Sauber managed to qualify in 5th ahead of Kimi Raikkonen in the disappointing McLaren. This is the first time this season that Kimi doesn't qualifies in 5th! 
Young Brazilian Felipe Massa didn't disappoint either managing 7th ahead of David Coulthard. Panis and an impressive Mika Salo make the top 10. 
The Arrows pair of Frentzen and Bernoldi are in 11th and 12th ahead of the first Renault with Button un 13th (his team-mate only managed 16th). McNish was 14th with the rest of the field made up of the 3 remaining Honda runners, the Jaguars and the Minardis.

The session started very slowly with Mark Webber going out after 10 minutes. Montoya followed him a couple of minutes later but pitted just after one lap. 
A few drivers set lap time and by the 24th minute, Ralf Schumacher had taken provisional Pole but with a relatively slow time. A couple of minutes later Raikkonen then Coulthard top the timesheets.
Just as most of the cars were on the track for their first runs, Trulli spins due to an engine failure spilling oil on the track. Several cars go off harmlessly and the session is stopped as the marshals clean the track.

After the restart, Ralf Schumacher took provisional pole back while Montoya once again aborts his run returning to the pits without setting a time!.
Moments later Barrichello takes provisional pole as Michael hits traffic and goes second.

With 10 minutes to go, Ralf Schumacher managed to split the Ferraris on his 3rd run. Montoya manages 7th.

5 minutes to go and both Michael and Rubens go out again (Michael in the spare and appearing frustrated), Barrichello goes off on his first flying lap trying to avoid Salo but on his second flyer improves his time at the top again. Michael meanwhile doesn't improve and settles for 3rd. 
In the final minute Ralf tries to grab pole but fails while Montoya manages to improve into 4th after racing with time when he was called for scrutineering.

Interestingly, Michael Schumacher, Heinz Harald Frentzen and Jacques Villeneuve and Alex Yoong set times slower than their best times this morning. The first 3 were Bridgestone runner possibly indicating a degraded performance under warmer conditions.

The field is too close. From 4th to 18th, a gap of only 0.94 seconds!

In the battle of the team-mates, Mark Webber continues to outqualify his team-mate by a massive margin (0.948 seconds this time.). Ralf Schumacher qualified superbly while Montoya just managed to get 4th and 0.754 seconds behind while Michael Schumacher struggled with his car and ended up 0.622 seconds behind his team-mate.
Enrique Bernoldi continues to prove he is becoming a worthy contender being just 0.052 seconds behind his more experienced team-mate Heinz Harald Frentzen while Felipe Massa was just 0.099 seconds behind his team-mate Nick Heidfeld.

Ralf Schumacher (2), Nick Heidfeld (5), Felipe Massa (7), Olivier Panis (9), Enrique Bernoldi (12) and Allan McNish (14) had their best Qualifying positions so far this season. Rubens Barrichello (1) and Mika Salo (10) equalled their best positions. 

Michael Schumacher (3), Kimi Raikkonen (6), David Coulthard (8), Jenson Button (13), Jarno Trulli (16) and Jacques Villeneuve (17) had their worst Qualifying positions so far this season. Giancarlo Fisichella (15), Mark Webber (21) and Alex Yoong (22) equalled their worst positions.

Click here for a more detailed analysis including the Also Ran award by the Quali-flyer  
Click here of the Qualifying table for the drivers this season  

It will be an interesting start to the race tomorrow!

Race starts at 2:00 PM local time. Our coverage starts at 1:30 PM local time.

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