Webber: I'm still in the title hunt

The Australian will start lowest of the four world championship contenders behind Red Bull team-mate Sebastian Vettel who is on pole, McLaren's Lewis Hamilton who is second and Ferrari's Fernando Alonso third.

"I'm not rapt of course, to be fifth on the grid is not very good," Webber told the BBC. "It's disappointing of course but there is still a long way to go tomorrow.

"The fat lady hasn't sung yet. I would have liked to have been further up but I just couldn't get the pace."

Webber added that while his grid position is a disadvantage, he needs to stay in play through tomorrow's 55-lap race.

"We need to be there at the end of course," he said. "A lot of things can still happen in the race. I haven't helped things by our performance today but we've seen races change so we are not... the championship isn't decided today but it would have been nice to be further up."

Asked whether he still felt he could overhaul Alonso and win the world title, he replied: "Well you could be more confident but at the end of the day we are still in the hunt and that's the main thing."