Green's hot pole streak continues

Car control and judgement of track conditions was at a premium as the British Mercedes driver pulled out a stunning final lap in the treacherously damp final qualifying session to pip AMG teammate Mika Hakkinen by 0.240 seconds, as light drizzle meant a long run on slick tyres proved to be the right way to go.

Audi's Mattias Ekstrom will start third, but was robbed of a final lap to try to go quicker as his A4 didn't have enough fuel to complete another tour. Ekstrom had just gone quickest and had the time to do another lap when he was called in.

Green rubbed salt into Audi's wounds by saying: "It was a good move to have enough fuel in the car to stay out until the end. It was all about the driving today, not the set-up. It was about trying to find the available grip, getting the heat into the tyres and how to drive the car to the maximum in the conditions."

Bernd Schneider ended the session fourth fastest, but was a surprising 1.5 seconds off the pace, while Audi's Tom Kristensen was also forced to stop early, due to a lack of fuel, and will start fifth with a best time over two seconds off Green's pole time.

Mercedes trio Jean Alesi, Bruno Spengler and Alexandros Margaritis also made it through to the final stage of the knock-out qualifying, and will start sixth, seventh and eighth respectively. The biggest casualties of the knock-out stages were the 2006 Audis of Heinz-Harald Frentzen and Martin Tomczyk, who will start 10th and 12th.

Qualifying times

Pos  Driver             Make               Time
 1.  Jamie Green        Mercedes C-Klasse  1:19.390
 2.  Mika Hakkinen      Mercedes C-Klasse  1:19.630
 3.  Mattias Ekstrom    Audi A4            1:19.968
 4.  Bernd Schneider    Mercedes C-Klasse  1:20.940
 5.  Tom Kristensen     Audi A4            1:21.396
 6.  Jean Alesi         Mercedes C-Klasse  1:21.519
 7.  Bruno Spengler     Mercedes C-Klasse  1:22.152
 8.  A. Margaritis      Mercedes C-Klasse  1:23.446
 9.  Christian Abt      Audi A4            1:17.120
10.  H. H. Frentzen     Audi A4            1:17.123
11.  Pierre Kaffer      Audi A4            1:17.142
12.  Martin Tomczyk     Audi A4            1:17.193
13.  Timo Scheider      Audi A4            1:17.242
14.  Frank Stippler     Audi A4            1:17.529
15.  Mathias Lauda      Mercedes C-Klasse  1:17.642
16.  Stefan Mucke       Mercedes C-Klasse  1:17.661
17.  Daniel la Rosa     Mercedes C-Klasse  1:17.937
18.  Susie Stoddart     Mercedes C-Klasse  1:18.271
19.  Olivier Tielemans  Audi A4            1:18.774
20.  Vanina Ickx        Audi A4            1:19.634