page_title: 2009 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix
section_title: Qualifying
hierarchical_section_title: 2009 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix / Report / Qualifying
caption_attribution_description: English: Jenson Button Brawn BGP 001 on Saturday at 2009 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix Русский: Дженсон Баттон на Брауне BGP 001 в воскресенье на Гран-при Абу-Даби 2009 года
context_page_description: The 2009 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix was the seventeenth and final Formula One motor race of the 2009 Formula One season. It took place on 1 November 2009 at the 3.45-mile Hermann Tilke-designed Yas Marina Circuit. It was the inaugural Abu Dhabi Grand Prix and also the first ever day-night Grand Prix. The race was won by Sebastian Vettel for Red Bull, with polesitter Lewis Hamilton having retired due to a brake failure. This would be the last Formula One race for Kazuki Nakajima and Giancarlo Fisichella and the Brawn GP, BMW Sauber and Toyota teams.
context_section_description: Lewis Hamilton was the fastest in the first qualifying session, becoming the first man to set a lap time of less than 1:40.000 with a 1:39.873. Fellow Briton Jenson Button was the only other driver who came close, with his best lap time half a second slower than Hamilton. For the third race of the season – after Luca Badoer in Valencia and Spa – a Ferrari qualified in twentieth and last place, with Giancarlo Fisichella finishing one second behind Kimi Räikkönen and two behind Hamilton. Joining Fisichella in an early elimination were the Force Indias of Adrian Sutil and Vitantonio Liuzzi and the Renaults of Fernando Alonso and Romain Grosjean after Jaime Alguersuari relegated Alonso to fifteenth place in the final few minutes of the first session.
  Hamilton once again topped the second session with another lap time under 1:40.000, though this time Sebastian Vettel was able to break the same barrier as well, the only other person to do so all weekend. By the time the second session had come around, night was falling over the circuit, and with it the track temperature dropped. Despite the cars carrying less fuel in the second session, the difference in lap times between Q1 and Q2 was noticeably smaller than at other races, with many of the drivers struggling to improve upon their first-session times. Heikki Kovalainen came to a halt on the circuit with a gearbox failure, which would afford him a five-place penalty for the race. Elsewhere, the second Ferrari of Kimi Räikkönen was eliminated, as were Jaime Alguersuari and Kazuki Nakajima. Kamui Kobayashi was also eliminated after qualifying twelfth, just one place behind his starting position in Brazil.
  The third session was unique in that once the drivers left the pits, they stayed out for the duration; in previous races, they have gone out once at the start and once at the end, or simply waited until the final few minutes to set a time. This was attributed to the tyres, as it took several laps for the drivers to get either compound up to a working temperature. Lewis Hamilton remained in the pits while the other nine took to the circuit. The lap times started falling as the drivers did several laps, with Jenson Button and Jarno Trulli exchanging lap times before Hamilton emerged and took the provisional pole. Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber both went faster, only for Hamilton to secure a front-row berth on his final lap with a 1:40.948 and leaving Vettel and Webber second and third respectively. Rubens Barrichello slotted into fourth, while Button edged out Trulli for fifth. The BMW Saubers of Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld took seventh and eighth, followed by the Williams of Nico Rosberg in his final race for the Grove-based team, and Sébastien Buemi taking tenth on his twenty-first birthday.
caption: Jenson Button qualified fifth for his first race as World Champion-elect.
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon EOS-1Ds Mark III", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image DateTime": "2009:11:01 17:10:08", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "208", "GPS GPSVersionID": "[2, 2, 0, 0]", "Image GPSInfo": "8128", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "10016", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "11193", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/500", "EXIF FNumber": "28/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Shutter Priority", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "800", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2009:11:01 17:10:08", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2009:11:01 17:10:08", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "9", "EXIF ApertureValue": "5", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire", "EXIF FocalLength": "400", "EXIF SubSecTime": "09", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "09", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "09", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "5616", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3744", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "8082", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "1872000/473", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "83200/21", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Manual", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}