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The FIA now publishes the weights of each car after qualifying on Saturday.  Those cars that make it through to the final qualifying session must use the fuel they qualified with while the rest of the field may refuel before the race.

Below is a graph showing the actual top ten qualifying times as well as those times adjusted for the weight of fuel each car is carrying.  The graph assumes a standard lap time cost of 0.3 seconds per 10kg of fuel.

From these weights we can see that pole sitter Vettel is fueled lighter than Button alongside him while on the second row Barrichello is fueled lighter than the Red Bull of Mark Webber.  This could be good news for both Button and Webber tomorrow as their adjusted times are quicker than the cars alongside them.

Massa’s hopes for another victory look even more remote when we see that his team mate Kimi Raikkonen outqualified him despite carrying more fuel.

The one man that looks very out of place is Fernando Alonso.  His eighth place grid position was only possible because he was fueled lighter than anyone else on the grid.  He can expect a challenge from Rosberg and Kubica during the race.

2009 Turkish Grand Prix car weights

Image: Renault

Sebastian Vettel has claimed his second pole position of the season in qualifying for Sunday’s Turkish Grand Prix.

The German’s time of 1:28.316 was enough to take the number one grid slot from Brawn GP’s Jenson Button.

Vettel’s team mate Mark Webber briefly had the fastest time in Q3 but will start behind Vettel tomorow on the second row, alongside Rubens Barrichello.

McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton missed out on getting through to the second qualifying session for the second time in a row.  While the team had been cautiously optimistic about their chances in Turkey this weekend, Hamilton seemed to lack confidence and struggled for grip in the twitchy MP4-24.  He will start from 16th on the grid.

Lewis Hamilton said afterwards:

Our car seems to have got slower relative to the others as the grip has gone down on the track.  I pushed as hard as I could today but I just had no grip out there.

Force India’s Adrian Sutil made it to Q2 for the second time in a row and he will start from 15th on the grid tomorrow, between the two McLarens.

Despite a good performance in practice, Ferrari’s Felipe Massa will start from the fourth row of the grid behind team mate Kimi Raikkonen.  He will have a hard time making it four Turkish victories in a row from there.

The new double-decker diffuser fitted to the BMWs of Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld seemed to have helped a little, lifting Kubica into Q3, but the team are still firmly in the mid-field.  The Red Bull diffuser on the other hand was finally given a chance to work properly after the slow corners of Monaco and either of the Red Bull drivers could be on the podium on Sunday.

2009 Formula One Turkish Grand Prix Qualifying Results

Image: Red Bull Racing

While today’s qualifying session for the Monaco Grand Prix was a disappointment for Lewis Hamilton, who hit the barriers in Q1, it was pole number four for fellow Brit Jenson Button.

Below is a graph showing the actual top ten qualifying times as well as those times adjusted for the weight of fuel each car is carrying.  The graph assumes a standard lap time cost of 0.3 seconds per 10kg of fuel.

While the order looks roughly correct, it does seem like Sebastian Vettel is a little out of position.  He has the lightest car on the grid and his adjusted time is slower than his team mate Mark Webber’s who is a couple of rows behind him in eighth.

The graph does show how good Kimi Raikkonen was, though.  He was the only driver to really match the pace of the Brawns and it wasn’t because he was running light.  With his KERS equipped Ferrari on the front row, he will be a definite threat to Jenson Button’s race on Sunday.

Image: Brawn GP

The proposed 2010 F1 Sporting Regulations will ban refuelling during the race.  This means that next year we will see a return to ‘proper’ qualifying where all cars run as light as possible to go as fast as possible.

As it stands now, those cars that make it through to the final qualifying session must use the fuel they qualified with while the rest of the field may refuel before the race.

In previous years this meant you could never be sure if a fast qualifying time was genuine or whether they were showboating with a light fuel load.  However, since the FIA started publishing the car weights after qualifying we can determine the relative performance of the top ten grid slots.

Below is a graph showing the actual top ten qualifying times as well as those times adjusted for the weight of fuel each car is carrying.  The graph assumes a standard lap time cost of 0.3 seconds per 10kg of fuel.

The graph shows that while Jenson Button is quick, Vettel was even quicker and Massa’s adjusted time is almost identical to Barrichello’s.

It’s going to be a battle between the Brazillians on the second row into the first corner!

2009 Spanish Grand Prix car weights

Image: Getty

Jenson Button claimed his third pole position of the year in Saturday’s qualifying for the Spanish Grand Prix.

Starting his final flying lap just seconds before the end of the session, Button set a lap time of 1:20.527, a tenth of a second faster than second place man Sebastian Vettel.

Button’s team mate, Rubens Barrichello, will start from third on the grid alongside Felipe Massa which should warm some cockles back at Maranello.

Kimi Raikkonen was driving the new ‘Superleggera’ version of the F60, which gave him 10kg more ballast weight to play with but while both the Red Cars were quick in practice an error in strategy saw Raikkonen being dropped in the first qualifying session.

In a repeat of Malaysia, Ferrari thought Kimi’s time would be enough to get him through to the second qualifying session and so decided not to send him out again.  As it turned out he was 2 tenths slower than Sebastien Buemi and will start way back on the eighth row of the grid.

Still, it does look like Ferrari have made significant improvement since Bahrain and Raikkonnen is confident the team can improve further:

We are still a bit behind, I would say, but it’s much stronger than it was before.  It’s only the first step, so we can get some more for the next races. After that, for sure we can catch them up even if it takes a little while.

I don’t know if we can tomorrow or not, but in the later races we can definitely fight for wins, podiums and good positions.

As expected, the McLarens of Lewis Hamilton and Heikki Kovalainen performed poorly and only managed 14th and 18th, respectively.

2009 Spanish Grand Prix Qualifying Results

Image: Brawn GP