Red Bull take front row in qualifying

All the talk before qualifying was once again regarding the changes in regulations and how they would affect Red Bull and once again Red Bull came along and locked out the front row.

But it was Australian Mark Webber who took pole position ahead of the dominant Sebastian Vettel.

With the fear of rain all the teams came out early in Qualifying One and it was Red Bull's Mark Webber who topped the timing boards.

Ferrari's Fernando Alonso had the only notable incident going off on a bit of a detour before the rain came and the drivers headed back to the new Silverstone pits with five minutes remaining of the session.

The drivers who were eliminated from this session were: Toro Rosso's Jaime Alguersuari and Sebastien Buemi, Virgin's Timo Glock, Lotus's Jarno Trulli, Virgin's Jerome D'Ambrosio, Hispania's Tonio Liuzzi and Daniel Ricciardo.

The changeable conditions in the second session very nearly caught out McLaren driver Jenson Button, but the 2009 Formula One World champion managed to save his Saturday session by jumping into the top ten on his final attempt.

Mercedes driver Michael Schumacher wasn't able to get into the pole position shoot-out and was only quick enough for thirteenth, his team-mate Rosberg finished the session fifth.

Ferrari's Felipe Massa topped the session.

The drivers eliminated were Force India's Adrian Sutil, Sauber's Sergio Perez, Mercedes's Michael Schumacher, Renault's Vitaly Petrov, Williams's Rubens Barrichello, Renault's Nick Heidfeld and Lotus's Heikki Kovalainen.

With rain expected again towards the end of the final qualifying session the drivers were out early and Mark Webber set the fastest time early on, McLaren's Lewis Hamilton surprisingly struggling 2 seconds behind Webber's time and he found himself in tenth midway through the pole position shoot-out.

With four minutes remaining the drivers headed to the pits for a change of tyres with the Red Bull's looking set to lock out the front row of the grid again with Vettel just a tenth behind Webber.

Ferrari had the second row to themselves with Alonso third and Massa fourth.

When the cars began to emerge the TV cameras started to pick up rain falling just as McLaren's Jenson Button and Mercedes Nico Rosberg began their final attempts, they both soon aborted their attempts as the rain fell and qualifying came to a premature end.

Force India's Paul di Resta in his first British Grand Prix will start sixth, Williams's Pastor Maldonado starts seventh, Kamui Kobayashi for Sauber will start eighth with Nico Rosberg ninth.