Britain F1 2008 - Qualifying : Maiden pole for Kovalainen

MCLAREN have claimed pole position for Sunday's Santander F1 British Grand Prix at Silverstone, but it was Heikki Kovalainen, not Lewis Hamilton who took the honours, with a stunning winning lap in Saturday qualifying.

The Finn, who looked faster than his team-mate throughout practice and qualifying sessions, had to battle against spitting rain and high winds which affected the cars on the exposed circuit during the first part of final qualifying on Saturday afternoon, but secured his first ever pole with a time of one minute 21.049.

Hamilton's car was blown into an oversteer which put him on the gravel at Priory on his first lap in Q3, but his second run put him into second, until Mark Webber snatched a surprise second-place for the Milton Keynes-based Red Bull team, and Kimi Raikkonen, for Ferrari, knocked Hamilton down to fourth spot.

BMW Sauber's Nick Heidfeld was fifth ahead of Renault's Fernando Alonso.

World championship leader Felipe Massa, for Ferrari, will be desperately disappointed with ninth place, behind Renault's Nelson Piquet Jr and Toro Rosso's Sebastian Vettel.

Brackley-based Honda endured another dismal qualifying showing, Jenson Button failing to advance to Q2 at his home GP for the third successive year and managing only 17th on the grid, one spot behind team-mate Rubens Barrichello. Silverstone-based Force India-Ferrari also failed to make it through Q1.

There was much discussion trackside on what fuel loads the teams were running, as there was a relatively big difference in times between the top few drivers. Sunday's race is expected to be wet, and carrying more fuel into a rain-affected grand prix can be a good strategy.

Silverstone Grand Prix Qualifying Results
1. Heikki Kovalainen (Fin) McLaren one minute 21.049 seconds
2. Mark Webber (Aus) RedBull-Renault 1:21.554
3. Kimi Raikkonen (Fin) Ferrari 1:21.706
4. Lewis Hamilton (GB) McLaren 1:21.835
5. Nick Heidfeld (Ger) BMW Sauber 1:21.873
6. Fernando Alonso (Spa) Renault 1:22.029
7. Nelson Piquet (Bra) Renault 1:22.491
8. Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1:23.251
9. Felipe Massa (Bra) Ferrari 1:23.305
10. Robert Kubica (Pol) BMW Sauber no time
11. David Coulthard (GB) RedBull-Renault 1:20.174
12. Timo Glock (Ger) Toyota 1:20.274
13. Sebastien Bourdais (Fra) Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1:20.531
14. Jarno Trulli (Ita) Toyota 1:20.601
15. Kazuki Nakajima (Jap) Williams-Toyota 1:21.112
16. Rubens Barrichello (Bra) Honda 1:21.512
17. Jenson Button (GB) Honda 1:21.631
18. Nico Rosberg (Ger) Williams-Toyota 1:21.668
19. Adrian Sutil (Ger) Force India-Ferrari 1:21.786
20. Giancarlo Fisichella (Ita) Force India-Ferrari 1:21.885