Sebastian Vettel secures 13th pole position of the season in India

The Red Bull driver was quickest in Q2, and carried that form into Q3 with a 1m24.437s provisional pole on his first flying lap.

No one managed to beat that, but Vettel improved to 1m24.178s anyway to firmly cement his pole.

It will be an all-Red Bull front row, as although Lewis Hamilton was second quickest for McLaren, his three-place penalty for a yellow flag infringement in practice will drop him to fifth and elevate Mark Webber from third to second.

Fernando Alonso was just 0.011 seconds down on Webber in the top Ferrari, with Jenson Button next up for McLaren.

Felipe Massa took sixth on the grid despite crashing right at the end of Q3 when he smashed his suspension over a kerb then skated off into the gravel at the next corner.

Nico Rosberg was seventh for Mercedes, while the remaining Q3 men all chose to sit out the segment to save tyres. Adrian Sutil was classified eighth in the only Force India to make it to Q3, with his team-mate Paul di Resta in 13th. Both Jaime Alguersuari and Sebastien Buemi also reached Q3 but Toro Rosso opted not to run.

Toro Rosso's strong performance squeezed some likely top 10 names outside the Q3 cut. Neither Renault made it - Vitaly Petrov and Bruno Senna will start back in 11th and 15th, although Petrov could consider himself unlucky as he equalled 10th-placed Alguersuari's Q2 time but the Spaniard got there first. Petrov is carrying a five-place grid penalty for colliding with Michael Schumacher in Korea in any case.

Schumacher also narrowly missed out, the Mercedes driver missing Q3 by 0.018s as he qualified 12th.

The two Williams of Pastor Maldonado and Rubens Barrichello sandwiched Senna in 14th and 16th.

It was a tough qualifying for Sauber. Sergio Perez was only 17th and will take a three-place penalty anyway for the same misdemeanour as Hamilton, while Kamui Kobayashi was eliminated in Q1 - a fate that could have befallen either Button or Schumacher had they not squeezed out strong late laps amid traffic.

HRT's Narain Karthikeyan qualified ahead of both Virgins for his home race, and will gain another position from his team-mate Daniel Ricciardo taking a gearbox penalty. Another gearbox fault meant Virgin's Timo Glock was firmly slowest.

Pos  Driver                Team                 Time           Gap   
 1.  Sebastian Vettel      Red Bull-Renault     1m24.178s
 2.  Lewis Hamilton        McLaren-Mercedes     1m24.474s  + 0.296
 3.  Mark Webber           Red Bull-Renault     1m24.508s  + 0.330
 4.  Fernando Alonso       Ferrari              1m24.519s  + 0.341
 5.  Jenson Button         McLaren-Mercedes     1m24.950s  + 0.772
 6.  Felipe Massa          Ferrari              1m25.122s  + 0.944
 7.  Nico Rosberg          Mercedes             1m25.451s  + 1.273
 8.  Adrian Sutil          Force India-Mercedes
 9.  Sebastien Buemi       Toro Rosso-Ferrari
10.  Jaime Alguersuari     Toro Rosso-Ferrari
Q2 cut-off time: 1m26.319s                                   Gap **
11.  Vitaly Petrov         Renault              1m26.319s   + 1.662
12.  Michael Schumacher    Mercedes             1m26.337s   + 1.680
13.  Paul di Resta         Force India-Mercedes 1m26.503s   + 1.846
14.  Pastor Maldonado      Williams-Cosworth    1m26.537s   + 1.880
15.  Bruno Senna           Renault              1m26.651s   + 1.994
16.  Rubens Barrichello    Williams-Cosworth    1m27.247s   + 2.590
17.  Sergio Perez          Sauber-Ferrari       1m27.562s   + 2.905
Q1 cut-off time: 1m27.479s                                    Gap *
18.  Kamui Kobayashi       Sauber-Ferrari       1m27.876s   + 1.687
19.  Heikki Kovalainen     Lotus-Renault        1m28.565s   + 2.376
20.  Jarno Trulli          Lotus-Renault        1m28.752s   + 2.563
21.  Daniel Ricciardo      HRT-Cosworth         1m30.216s   + 4.027
22.  Narain Karthikeyan    HRT-Cosworth         1m30.238s   + 4.049
23.  Jerome D'Ambrosio     Virgin-Cosworth      1m30.866s   + 4.677
24.  Timo Glock            Virgin-Cosworth      1m34.046s   + 7.857

107% time: 1m32.222s