Michael wins battle of the Schumachers

13 April 2012

Michael Schumacher shattered his brother Ralf's hopes of celebrating his maiden pole position by snatching top spot on the grid at the European Grand Prix in Germany today.

The world champion produced a blistering lap in his Ferrari to grab his seventh pole in nine races this season and the 39th of his career at the Nurburgring.

Schumacher won the family duel by just over 0.2 seconds as Ralf had to settle for second place behind his big brother in his Williams-BMW.

Williams team-mate Juan Pablo Montoya was third with Brazil's Rubens Barrichello fourth in the other Ferrari followed by the McLarens of David Coulthard and Mika Hakkinen.

Eddie Irvine qualified in 12th spot for Jaguar Racing while Jenson Button had another nightmare session finishing back in 20th place for Benetton.

The Schumachers will start a race alongside each other on the grid for the second grand prix in succession and the third this season.

Schumacher junior, who won the last race in Canada, looked poised to claim his maiden pole just one day after signing a contract to stay with Williams until the end of the 2004 season.

The 25-year-old had displaced Coulthard from the top of the time-sheets boosting hopes that Williams would celebrate their first pole since the final race of the 1997 season in Jerez.

Montoya also went second at one stage and the team have not dominated a front row since Jacques Villeneuve and Heinz-Harald Frentzen started the British Grand Prix at Silverstone alongside each other at the front.

But reigning champion Schumacher ended their hopes on his second qualifying run having just missed out on his first time on the circuit to give himself the perfect opportunity to extend his championship lead in tomorrow's race.

Coulthard faces a real battle trying to win from fifth spot and cut his 18-point deficit to Schumacher in a race that marks the mid-way point of the campaign.

The 30-year-old Scot saw his last-gasp effort to improve his grid position left in tatters when he ran into the gravel at the final corner and came to a halt.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in