Massa takes dominant pole in Bahrain

Felipe Massa stormed to his fifth career pole and his second of the season ahead of Lewis Hamilton in Bahrain. Kimi Raikkonen qualified third, narrowly edging out Fernando Alonso in fourth.

First qualifying saw Sato, Liuzzi, Speed, Sutil, Albers and David Coulthard all drop out - the Red Bull driver unable to set a competitive time when he lost fifth, sixth and seventh gears.

The second session knocked out Wurz, Kovalainen, Davidson, Ralf Schumaher and the two Hondas of Barrichello and Button.

The pole shoot-out looked to be a straight fight between Felipe Massa and Lewis Hamilton - the Ferrari got the early upper hand by just 0.028s after both had completed their first flying laps, and Massa went even faster on his next attempt.

Massa took pole with a dominant 1m32.652s lap, 0.3s ahead of Felipe Massa. Kimi Raikkonen qualified third while Alonso ended up fourth, 0.061s behind the Ferrari.

BMW swept up the third row of the grid with Heidfeld fifth and Kubica sixth while Fisichella showed some rare pace to qualify seventh. Webber, Trulli and Rosberg rounded off the top ten.

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