Bahrain GP Qualifying - Trulli on pole for Toyota

Toyota had already shown impressive pace in practice ahead of qualifying for the Bahrain Grand Prix and were one of the three teams to spend two week’s testing at the 5.412km circuit in the off-season. The hard work paid off handsomely for the German-based squad today as Jarno Trulli stormed to pole position from team-mate Timo Glock.

As ever, we do not know the fuel loads until later today, but the TF109 package looked strong and Trulli put in a faultless performance to stop the clocks in 1:33.431s, just under three-tenths of a second clear of Glock.

While Toyota celebrate a superb qualifying result - and their first pole since Suzuka 2005 - Chinese Grand Prix victors Red Bull Renault had a very mixed day with Sebastian Vettel qualifying a solid third while team-mate Mark Webber fell at the first hurdle courtesy of some inattentive driving from Adrian Sutil.

Championship leader Jenson Button lines up fourth and was disappointed with the qualifying pace of the Brawn Mercedes while team-mate Rubens Barrichello was sixth best in the second BGP 001. Defending champion Lewis Hamilton meanwhile enjoyed his most competitive qualifying session of the season as he split the Brawn duo with the fifth fastest time in his McLaren Mercedes.

Fernando Alonso lines up seventh in the leading Renault while team-mate Nelson Piquet was at least able to make the second round of qualifying for the first time this year and was 15th fastest in his updated R29. Still, there will be no escaping the massive second plus gap between the Renault duo in the second round of qualifying plus another error from the under-pressure Brazilian racer.

Ferrari are having a tough start to the season with the F60 package but at least today both Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen both made it into the final round of qualifying. Massa starts eighth with Raikkonen seemingly heavily fuelled starts tenth.

The team are of course chasing their first points of the season and while the car may not yet feature any developments, the Italian squad seem in much better shape than in recent events.

Williams Toyota have flattered to deceive again this weekend after Rosberg looked very strong in practice only to qualify ninth in his updated FW31. Team-mate Kazuki Nakajima starts 12th behind the second McLaren Mercedes of Heikki Kovalainen.

BMW Sauber have not looked fast for some time now and today was no exception as Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld slithered around to 13th and 14th positions on the grid. For a team leading the championship a year ago, the updates to the F1.09 package cannot come soon enough.

Adrian Sutil qualified 16th in the leading Force India Mercedes behind Piquet, but was involved in an incident late in the first round of qualifying that saw him inadvertently block Webber. The end result was the Red Bull Renault driver had his final qualifying lap severely compromised and the disappointed Australian was 19th fastest. However, the Force India racer was later handed a three position grid penalty dropping him to 19th and promoting Webber up one position.

Sebastien Buemi qualified 17th in his Toro Rosso Ferrari and will therefore start 16th in his Toro Rosso Ferrari ahead of Giancarlo Fisichella in his Force India, Webber, Sutil and Sebastien Bourdais in the second STR4.