Red Bull showed their dominance yet again, with Sebastian Vettel taking pole quite comfortable as Mark Webber finished second in the qualifying session of the Formula One Australian GP at Albert Park.
Vettel took first place on the grid for Sunday's race with a time of 1:27.407, with Webber timing 1:27.827 for second.
"Obviously I was very happy with the result, but with the adjusted schedule we can't be too euphoric right now -- in a few hours the race is coming up, so it's head down again to get on with that," Vettel said. "Obviously it's a very good result for myself and the team and with Mark in second we have a front row -- it's a surprise after not knowing where we were in winter testing."
"I think with such intense conditions like yesterday and today, it's always easy to make a meal of it, but we didn't," Webber added. "It was slippery yesterday and we came back again today for a very short explosive session. It's all over in a flash.
"We needed to get things right, I would have liked two laps but we finished up the grid at the right end. The weather can change very quickly here, so it's always hard to make a call."
The Red Bull pair was followed by Lewis Hamilton, driving for his new Mercedes team, with Ferrari driver Felipe Massa just edging his teammate Fernando Alonso to fourth.
Hamilton timed 1:28.087 and will now need to use all of his race skills to catch up with the Red Bulls, who look like romping to another win.
"The conditions were very tricky out there today and the team did a great job to get us out at the right times," Hamilton said. "I haven't had the best of weekends so far so I'm happy to have finally put a good lap together today. I've done a lap more than Sebastian on my tyres so I might struggle to go as long on the first stint but I'll give it everything I can in the race this afternoon."
Hamilton's Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg will lineup sixth on the grid, while Lotus duo Kimi Raikkonen and Romain Grosjean finished seventh and eighth respectively.
