Sebastian Vettel achieved his 40th career pole position in Formula 1 with a dominant performance, as his rivals made a complete mess of the qualifying session.
Fernando Alonso could only managed fifth after another failed attempt in slipstreaming by Ferrari, while neither Lewis Hamilton nor Kimi Raikkonen made it into the top ten.
Mark Webber did however make it a Red Bull one-two, while an impressive effort from Nico Hulkenberg gave Sauber a shock third place on the Italian Grand Prix grid.
Ferrari had experimented with its drivers giving each other slipstreams in final practice, but its efforts to recreate that same strategy in Q3 fell apart.
The cars were never close enough to make the strategy work and appeared to end up spoiling each other’s laps. Felipe Massa eventually qualified in fourth place ahead of Alonso.
Webber looked to have a shot at displacing Vettel right at the end of Q3, but was first on the scene as Jean-Eric Vergne’s Toro Rosso ploughed through the Parabolica gravel.
That left Vettel clearly on pole with a time of one minute, 23.755 seconds lap, two tenths quicker than his Red Bull team-mate.
As for Lewis Hamilton, the 2008 world champion admitted it was poor driving on his part – running wide on the exit of Parabolica – which meant a disappointing qualifying result.
Lotus appeared to be simply short of pace, with Raikkonen and team-mate Romain Grosjean only P11 and P13.
While they all under-performed, Hulkenberg starred with a Q3 lap just 0.037 seconds off Webber’s Red Bull and ahead of the Ferraris and Nico Rosberg’s Mercedes.
Toro Rosso got two cars into the top ten shootout, with Daniel Ricciardo seventh but Vergne’s mistake leaving him tenth.
The McLarens will start behind them, with Sergio Perez out-qualifying Jenson Button.
Force India looked in jeopardy of a Q1 exit until late improvements for both drivers, but there was little progress in Q2.
Post-qualifying, the race stewards handed a three-pace grid penalty for Adrian Sutil. The Force India driver had impended Lewis Hamilton’s run into Parabolica.
Paul di Resta ended up P16, just behind fellow late Q1 escapee Pastor Maldonado.
Rookies Esteban Gutierrez and Valtteri Bottas were ultimately the drivers who joined the Caterhams and Marussias at the back.
So a great result for Red Bull Racing. The team’s fifty pole in the sport, with the triple world champion scoring his fourth pole position of the year. Will we see the superb driver/team combo win again on Sunday? We shall see on one of the fastest tracks on the calendar and the final European race of the season.
Qualifying times from Monza:
1. Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault 1m23.755s
2. Mark Webber Red Bull-Renault 1m23.968s
3. Nico Hulkenberg Sauber-Ferrari 1m24.065s
4. Felipe Massa Ferrari 1m24.132s
5. Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1m24.142s
6. Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1m24.192s
7. Daniel Ricciardo Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m24.209s
8. Sergio Perez McLaren-Mercedes 1m24.502s
9. Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes 1m24.515s
10. Jean-Eric Vergne Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m28.050s
11. Kimi Raikkonen Lotus-Renault 1m24.610s
12. Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1m24.803s
13. Romain Grosjean Lotus-Renault 1m24.848s
14. Pastor Maldonado Williams-Renault 1m25.011s
15. Paul di Resta Force India-Mercedes 1m25.077s
16. Esteban Gutierrez Sauber-Ferrari 1m25.226s
17. Adrian Sutil Force India-Mercedes 1m24.932s*
18. Valtteri Bottas Williams-Renault 1m25.291s
19. Giedo van der Garde Caterham-Renault 1m26.406s
20. Charles Pic Caterham-Renault 1m26.563s
21. Jules Bianchi Marussia-Cosworth 1m27.085s
22. Max Chilton Marussia-Cosworth 1m27.480s
107 per cent time: 1m30.221s
*Three-place penalty for impeding Lewis Hamilton









