Mika Hakkinen hold the pole

Mika Hakkinen continued his domination of practice for the British Grand Prix on Sunday with two qualifying laps out of four runs good enough to give him the pole, his final best lap two tenth's clear of his closest opposition. "The car has been perfect all weekend. I think we timed the run just right. The track seemed to get a little slower after the first 2 minutes or so," explained Mika, who took his sixth pole of the season.

David Coulthard was disappointed to be almost eight-tenth's of a second slower than his team-mate at his home race, but still happy to be starting from third place on the grid. "I have been having trouble with te stability of the car under braking all weekend. I cannot carry the speed into a couple of the corners and that has slowed my times," said David.

Schumacher shares the front row

Michael Schumacher got to within four-tenth's of the pole position, but admitted he could not have matched Hakkinen's time even though he set his fastest lap on his first run. "As usual I got pretty close to the limit of the car on my first run and from then on I tried to improve on that which meant that I exceeded the limits of the car on my other runs and did not go any quicker," explained Michael."The track was also a bit slower for the last two runs. I could perhaps have gone a little quicker, but not enough to make any difference," he added.

Eddie Irvine had to adjust his set-up to the different tyres which he had not tried last week. "I got quite a good set-up on my last run," said Irvine, who took fourth fastest overall. It is planned to race both cars with the new 048B spec engines tomorrow.

Jordan share row three

Heinz-Harald Frentzen and Damon Hill will be sharing the third row of the grid for Jordan, Frentzen hoping to regain his fourth place from Irvine on his last run, but slowed by a sudden understeer in the last section of the lap. "I don't know why, but the car suddenly understeered and I missed the apex of the corner," said Frentzen.

Damon Hill was delighted the handling of his car which was the best he has known it all year. "It was sliding around a bit too much in the slow corners, but perfect in the high speed stuff," said Hill.

In brief...

Barrichello was disappointed not to make the top six with his Stewart saying that he didn't have the confidence in the car to extract the best time. Herbert was 11th. Ralf Schumacher expected to be just behind the Jordans, but ended up eighth. Zanardi was back in 13th place, losing out to his team-mate in the quicker corners.

Villeneuve and Alesi completed the top 10 places, Villeneuve blocked on his best lap by Ralf Schumacher, while Alesi wasn't happy with tenth, saying that his problems yesterday had cost him the chance of being much higher up. He also had a spin during qualifying, but managed to get going again. Fisichella and Wurz changed the set-up of their Benettons but found them no better and were unable to better 17th and 18th places, their worst showing of the season.

Qualifying Results

Pos  Driver        Team                 Time                   
 1.  Hakkinen      Mclaren Mercedes     1:24.804   218.197 kmph
 2.  M.Schumacher  Ferrari              1:25.223   + 0.419     
 3.  Coulthard     Mclaren Mercedes     1:25.634   + 0.830     
 4.  Irvine        Ferrari              1:25.677   + 0.873     
 5.  Frentzen      Jordan Mugen-Honda   1:25.991   + 1.187     
 6.  Hill          Jordan Mugen-Honda   1:26.099   + 1.295     
 7.  Barrichello   Stewart Ford         1:26.194   + 1.390     
 8.  R.Schumacher  Williams Supertec    1:26.438   + 1.634     
 9.  Villeneuve    BAR Supertec         1:26.719   + 1.915     
10.  Alesi         Sauber Petronas      1:26.761   + 1.957     
11.  Herbert       Stewart Ford         1:26.873   + 2.069     
12.  Diniz         Sauber Petronas      1:27.196   + 2.392     
13.  Trulli        Prost Peugeot        1:27.227   + 2.423     
14.  Zanardi       Williams Supertec    1:27.331   + 2.527     
15.  Panis         Prost Peugeot        1:27.543   + 2.739     
16.  Zonta         BAR Supertec         1:27.699   + 2.895     
17.  Fisichella    Benetton Playlife    1:27.857   + 3.053     
18.  Takagi        Arrows TWR           1:28.037   + 3.233     
19.  Wurz          Benetton Playlife    1:28.063   + 3.259     
20.  de la Rosa    Arrows TWR           1:28.148   + 3.344     
21.  Badoer        Minardi Ford         1:28.695   + 3.891     
22.  Gene          Minardi Ford         1:28.772   + 3.968     

Weather: Sunny, dry. Ambeint Temp. 23°C, Track Temp. 37°C

All timing unofficial