Massa clinches maiden F1 pole in Turkey

The Ferrari driver lapped the Istanbul Park circuit in a blistering 1:26.907 to eclipse his illustrious teammate Michael Schumacher.

The seven times world champion made it an all Ferrari front-row by setting a time three tenths of a second slower than the Brazilian.

And it wasn't a completely trouble-free session for the German as he twice ran wide at Turn One.

Behind the Ferraris for tomorrow's race will be both Renaults as championship leader Fernando Alonso qualified third ahead of his teammate Giancarlo Fisichella.

Ralf Schumacher (Toyota) finished in fifth, but will start 15th after he is demoted ten places on the starting grid for having an unscheduled engine change over the weekend.

Promoted to fifth was BMW Nick Heidfeld, followed by Britain's Jenson Button. Seventh on the 5.430km Istanbul Park circuit will be McLaren's Kimi Raikkonen ahead of Poland's Robert Kubica in his BMW and Mark Webber for Williams.

The first driver outside the top ten was Austrian Christian Klien. In the second period of qualifying, Klien's lap of 1:27.852 was just two tenths of a second shy of him making it into the last period top ten shoot-out. He will start the race in his Red Bull tomorrow in tenth after Ralf Schumacher's demotion.

The remaining drivers who failed to make the cut into the top ten, from 11th to 14th places were McLaren's Pedro de la Rosa, Toyota's Jarno Trulli, Honda's Rubens Barrichello and Nico Rosberg in the other Williams.

Dutchman Christijan Albers was the slowest runner in the second qualifying period, but he will start the race at the back of the grid after the Toyota engine was replaced in the back of his Midland.

At the start of qualifying in the opening 15 minute knockout period, Red Bull Racing's David Coulthard dropped into the bottom six and despite his best efforts couldn't do enough on his last lap to improve. The Scotsman didn't make it to the second period.

In addition, both Toro Rossos failed to graduate to Q2 and finished in 18th and 19th positions, with Scott Speed ahead of Tonio Liuzzi.

Behind him was the Midland Toyota Tiago Monteiro and both Super Aguri Hondas - with Sakon Yamamoto ahead of his Japanese compatriot Takuma Sato in 21st and 22nd places respectively.

The weather at Istanbul park was similar to yesterday with air temperatures hitting 34 degrees Celsius, while the track temperature peaked at 53 degrees C at the start of the hour.