Happy Massa now eyeing victory

The Ferrari driver, who had to start from the back of the grid in Australia after hitting trouble in qualifying, beat world champion Fernando Alonso by over three tenths of a second after a last-gap flying lap.

It was Massa's fourth pole position in Formula One, following the three he scored last year in Turkey, Japan and Brazil.

"I am quite happy, unfortunately in Melbourne it didn't finish like I expected, because I started from the back," said Massa. "I am not supposed to start from the back, here things looks a bit different.

"I intend to have a good race tomorrow, it will be tough. I hope I can stay in my position from the beginning.

"It was a great lap, I tried to do everything I could. On the second try I had traffic so I couldn't improve my laptime and the last one was a clean lap, it was just dropping a little bit some showers so thought there might be problems at the end of the lap but they didn't and it helped me a lot."

Massa, whose team dominated the Australian Grand Prix, admitted the McLarens were very strong in qualifying and is predicting a hard time to beat them in tomorrow's race.

Alonso's teammate Lewis Hamilton qualified in fourth place, behind Kimi Raikkonen.

"For sure I think at the end of the day McLaren were really, really competitive," Massa added.

"We expect them to be competitive but they were really strong in qualifying and it makes us work even harder to have a good race tomorrow, but for sure Fernando and Lewis showed they are very competitive."

Raikkonen, pole-setter in Australia but with engine problems at the end of the race, had to settle for third place, although the Finn is still hopeful of a strong race. 

"It has been a little bit guessing what is going to happen, but the engine is okay in the end," Raikkonen said. "It has been difficult to get the car right but it is not too bad and for the race it should be okay.

"I was expected to have some difficult but we should have a good race."