FORMULA ONE

• Vettel tops Webber for European GP pole

  Valencia, Spain (Sports Network) - Sebastian Vettel claimed his fourth pole of the season after edging his Red Bull teammate, Mark Webber, in Saturday's qualifying for the European Grand Prix.

  Vettel lapped the 3.367-mile Valencia street circuit in one minute, 37.587 seconds to give Red Bull its eighth pole position in the first nine grand prix this year.

  Two weeks ago, Lewis Hamilton from McLaren ended Red Bull's pole streak in Canada.

  "Obviously the last couple of races, we did not have a very smooth run," said Vettel, who was quickest in all three qualifying sessions. "Canada last race and here in Valencia, Spain usually are not our strongest, but it's good that we are able to put the car on pole, and our pace is looking very good." Webber qualified 0.075 seconds behind Vettel to capture the outside pole. It's the fourth 1-2 start for Red Bull this year.

  "It's very up to be on the front row with [Vettel]; it's a credit to the team," Webber said. "Today, we've had a good day, and [Valencia] is not one of our strongest circuits I would say. I think where you have a race against your opposition, we probably wouldn't choose this one. Let's see how tomorrow goes, and I'm very optimistic that we'll have a good race." Hamilton, who won the Canadian GP two weeks ago and claimed the points lead, greatly improved in qualifying with a third-place effort after he struggled in practices earlier this weekend.

  "I'm really happy to be here," Hamilton said. "I feel so fortunate. This weekend, we knew that a few people would be bringing updates. We saw from practice that we were quite a long way behind, so we were a little bit cautious pushing on the limit, but we didn't realize that we would be so far up." Hamilton won the pole for this race last year, but finished second to Rubens Barrichello.

  Fernando Alonso from Ferrari took the fourth spot, while his teammate Felipe Massa, winner of this race two years ago, qualified fifth.

  Renault's Robert Kubica grabbed the sixth spot, and Jenson Button from McLaren was seventh. Williams teammates Nico Hulkenberg and Barrichello qualified eighth and ninth, respectively.

  Vitaly Petrov from Renault completed the top-10.

  Mercedes GP's Michael Schumacher was knocked out of the second qualifying round.

  Schumacher, the seven-time Formula One champion, will start 15th. His teammate, Nico Rosberg, will roll off three spots ahead of him in 12th.

  Heading into Valencia, Hamilton has accumulated 109 points, compared to 106 for Button, the defending F1 champion, and 103 for Webber. Vettel is 19 points behind Hamilton.

  Sunday's European GP is scheduled to start at 8:00 a.m. (et).

  06/26 10:48:31 ET