The Silver Arrows pairing showed speed throughout qualifying as Hamilton had set the pace in Q1 from Rosberg. In 14th and 15th places the McLarens were perilously close to missing the Q2 cut, but the first man to do that was Valtteri Bottas, with 1m 23.260s for Williams. Team mate and last year’s winner Pastor Maldonado had no fairy story this time as he was 18th on 1m 23.318s.
Behind them, Giedo van der Garde snatched back the honours for Caterham at the last moment with 1m 24.661s, just after Jules Bianchi (1m 24.713s) and Max Chilton (1m 24.996s) had put Marussia ahead. Charles Pic was the final runner in the second Caterham, on 1m 25.070s.
As Hamilton again set the pace in Q2, the session brought embarrassment for his former team mate Jenson Button. The McLaren man wound up only 14th on 1m 22.355s, moments after team mate Sergio Perez had brought joy to the team with an excellent lap of 1m 21.790s which put him seventh.
The Toro Rossos just missed the Q3 cut, with Daniel Ricciardo finally acing Jean-Eric Vergne by the smallest margin, 1m 22.127s to 1m 22.166s. Adrian Sutil also missed out, after lapping his Force India in 1m 22.346s for 13th ahead of Button.
Behind the Englishman, Nico Hulkenberg and Esteban Gutierrez lined up their Saubers 15th and 16th on 1m 22.389s and 1m 22.793s respectively. Gutierrez was subsequently found guilty of impeding Lotus’s Kimi Raikkonen and was dropped to 19th on the grid by the Spanish stewards.
Ferrari's Felipe Massa was also under investigation having allegedly impeded Red Bull's Mark Webber during Q2. He was also handed a three-place penalty and eventually dropped to ninth on the grid from sixth.
Q3 had seen Rosberg set the pace on his first run with 1m 20.824s. He, the two Ferrari drivers, and the two Lotus drivers were the only ones to do two runs.
On his only run, Sebastian Vettel moved into P2 with 1m 21.054s, before Rosberg improved his time with 1m 20.718s and then Hamilton’s sole run saw him post 1m 20.972s to wrap up the front row in front of the onlooking Daimler boss Dr Zetsche.
Kimi Raikkonen held on to fourth for Lotus with 1m 21.177s, leaving the third row to the Ferraris. Local hero Fernando Alonso was fifth on 1m 21.218s, with Massa right on his tail with 1m 21.219s. Behind them, Romain Grosjean lost time with a big slide and was thus left seventh on 1m 21.308s ahead of Webber’s Red Bull on 1m 21.570s.
Perez was ninth for McLaren on 1m 22.069s as Paul di Resta secured 10th for Force India on 1m 22.233s.
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