Vettel secures another pole in Turkey

His team-mate Mark Webber completed an all-Red Bull front row, 0.4 seconds slower than Vettel, with the team so confident of its superiority that the two drivers went for just one early run in Q3 then sat in the pits watching their rivals fail to beat them.

Nico Rosberg underlined Mercedes' improvement by grabbing third on the grid, but his team-mate Michael Schumacher could not maintain his practice form and was only eighth.

The McLarens of Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button took fourth and sixth, split by Fernando Alonso - the Ferrari driver continuing to take fifth in every qualifying session of 2011.

Vitaly Petrov took seventh on the grid for Renault, two places ahead of team-mate Nick Heidfeld. Three-time Turkish Grand Prix winner Felipe Massa, who had an engine change after practice, made it into the top 10 but did not run in Q3 so will start 10th.

Rubens Barrichello gave Williams its best qualifying position of a tough season so far in 11th - though he had been on course for a Q3 slot until Heidfeld squeezed ahead by 0.024s in the dying moments of Q2. Pastor Maldonado was 14th in the second Williams, with the two Force Indias between them.

Kamui Kobayashi was classified last, his Sauber having cut out on the back straight before he could set a Q1 time. His team-mate Sergio Perez took 15th ahead of the Toro Rossos.

Lotus did not get a car through to Q2, though Heikki Kovalainen was within a respectable half-second of the cut-off as he beat team-mate Jarno Trulli by 0.9s.

Tonio Liuzzi impressively qualified his Hispania between the two Virgins - and will start ahead of both as Jerome D'Ambrosio's five-place grid penalty for a yellow flag infringement in practice means he will drop from 20th to last.

Pos  Driver                Team                 Time         Gap   
 1.  Sebastian Vettel      Red Bull-Renault     1m25.049s
 2.  Mark Webber           Red Bull-Renault     1m25.454s  + 0.405
 3.  Nico Rosberg          Mercedes             1m25.574s  + 0.525
 4.  Lewis Hamilton        McLaren-Mercedes     1m25.595s  + 0.546
 5.  Fernando Alonso       Ferrari              1m25.851s  + 0.802
 6.  Jenson Button         McLaren-Mercedes     1m25.982s  + 0.933
 7.  Vitaly Petrov         Renault              1m26.296s  + 1.247
 8.  Michael Schumacher    Mercedes             1m26.646s  + 1.597
 9.  Nick Heidfeld         Renault              1m26.659s  + 1.610
10.  Felipe Massa          Ferrari              No time
Q3 cut-off time: 1m26.740s                                   Gap **
11.  Rubens Barrichello    Williams-Cosworth    1m26.764s  + 1.154
12.  Adrian Sutil          Force India-Mercedes 1m27.027s  + 1.417
13.  Paul di Resta         Force India-Mercedes 1m27.145s  + 1.535
14.  Pastor Maldonado      Williams-Cosworth    1m27.236s  + 1.626
15.  Sergio Perez          Sauber-Ferrari       1m27.244s  + 1.634
16.  Sebastien Buemi       Toro Rosso-Ferrari   1m27.255s  + 1.645
17.  Jaime Alguersuari     Toro Rosso-Ferrari   1m27.572s  + 1.962
Q3 cut-off time: 1m28.321s                                    Gap *
18.  Heikki Kovalainen     Lotus-Renault        1m28.780s  + 1.767
19.  Jarno Trulli          Lotus-Renault        1m31.119s  + 2.106
20.  Jerome D'Ambrosio     Virgin-Cosworth      1m30.445s  + 3.432
21.  Tonio Liuzzi          HRT-Cosworth         1m30.692s  + 3.679
22.  Timo Glock            Virgin-Cosworth      1m30.813s  + 3.800
23.  Narain Karthikeyan    HRT-Cosworth         1m31.564s  + 4.551
24.  Kamui Kobayashi       Sauber-Ferrari       No time

107% time: 1m33.103s

* Gap to quickest in Q1

** Gap to quickest in Q2