Porteiro and Kovalainen top

The Finn lapped nearly half a second quicker than the second-fastest driver, his Pons Racing team-mate Adrian Valles, to put him in prime position to extend his championship lead on Sunday.

The Finn faltered under the new Super Pole format in first qualifying, brought in for the Barcelona track, in the first session. He was the first runner and uncertain how far he could push. He finished the session fourth quickest with Felix Porteiro taking top honours.

In the second qualifying session, though, he ran 14th out of 17 and was much more comfortable with his pace. Team-mate Valles recovered from a spin on his warm-up lap to edge out Narain Karthikeyan for second.

Porteiro could manage only 13th quickest second time round while team-mate Jean-Christophe Ravier dropped to seventh from third.

Kovalainen's nearest challenger in the points, Tiago Monteiro, was 11th.

Felix Porteiro Epsilon Euskadi 1m29.884secs
Adrian Valles Pons Racing 1m29.899secs
Jean-Christophe Ravier Epsilon Euskadi 1m30.068secs
Heikki Kovalainen Pons Racing 1m30.187secs
Narain Karthikeyan RC Motorsport 1m30.233secs
Tristan Gommendy Saulnier Racing 1m30.482secs

Heikki Kovalainen Pons Racing 1m30.141s
Adrian Valles Pons Racing +0.476s
Narain Karthikeyan RC Motorsport +0.480s
Tristan Gommendy Saulnier Racing +0.665s
Enrique Bernoldi GD Racing +0.978s
Sergio Hernandez Saulnier Racing +1.408s