Relaxed Barrichello feeling happy

"I think things in life happen for a reason," he said. "It's been a good start to the season. I feel relaxed, I've changed my approach to everything, so I feel good. It means a lot to be starting from pole position."

Barrichello's last pole came at the 2000 British GP, another session affected by rain, and he acknowledged the role the weather played.

"I had only two runs then it rained - actually the rain has helped me so many times in the past, and this time it helped me too. We were aware that it could rain sometime soon so we wanted to put in a time. On my first run there was some traffic, but I was able to do a quick second run and then it rained. We were expecting it to go away, but then it just got harder and harder."

The Ferrari drivers were the only ones on track when the rain was at its heaviest, but Barrichello doesn't think it gives them any advantage.

"It was only to have an idea really," he admitted. "You normally go flat out in qualifying just to have a feeling. We had some experience [of rain] on Friday morning, but if there's rain tomorrow morning then everybody's going to have a chance [to drive in the wet]."

After setting the pace in all the free practice sessions, Michael Schumacher was expected to walk it to the pole. However, he lost his first run when the session was red-flagged and then recorded a comparatively slow first sector time on his only other flying lap. Nevertheless, he was not too despondent.

"I don't know what lap time I would have done at this stage [when the red flag was shown] because I had to back off significantly for a yellow," he said. "But anyway we are both up front, which is where we wished to be and we're obviously quite happy with that. I look forward to whatever happens tomorrow."