Bridgestone's super soft tyre allowed driver Sebastian Vettel to set his second pole position, and Red Bull Racing's first ever, with a lap of 1min 36.184secs at Shanghai for the Chinese Grand Prix. Vettel took pole by just under two tenths from ING Renault's Fernando Alonso with Mark Webber (Red Bull Racing) in third, meaning the top three fastest cars were all Renault powered.

Track conditions were improved from Friday, with more rubber down. AT&T Williams driver Nico Rosberg used the super soft tyre to go fastest in the morning practice session with a time of 1min 36.133secs.

Q&A with Hirohide Hamashima - Bridgestone Director of Motorsport Tyre Development

What was significant about today's running?
"Today was very significant for Red Bull Racing scoring their first pole position so congratulations to them and Sebastian Vettel. Today we have seen that both tyres give good performance here in Shanghai. The difference in best lap time between the two tyres is not so big, at around 0.5 seconds. The super soft gives its best lap time on the first or second flying lap, whereas the medium takes longer to get into the best temperature operating range and delivers its best lap on its third or fourth flying lap. We are still seeing graining on the super soft tyre, however this is not matched by the same amount of tyre degradation that we saw in Australia so there should be more strategy options for tomorrow's race."

The weather has been quite variable in China, how could this affect the race?
"Of course, this race is taking place at a different time of year from last season so we expected the weather to be different. It is also the first race of the season at the Shanghai International Circuit, so the track conditions are changed from those we saw last year too. Since we have been here the weather has been both quite cool and also quite warm, so it will be interesting to see what happens on Sunday. If it is cooler, the quicker warm-up of the super soft tyre should be useful, however if it is very cool we could see more graining. If it is hotter then the medium tyre will warm-up quicker. Of course, we have seen rain at Shanghai in the past, and we all know that makes for very interesting racing. Tomorrow we will keenly watch both strategy and the skies.

Stats of the Day 
Practice Three 11:00 - 12:00 	Qualifying 14:00 - 15:00
Driver 	 Time       Tyre 	Driver   Time 	     Tyre
Rosberg  1m 36.133s SS 		Vettel 	 1m 36.184s  SS	
Trulli 	 1m 36.272s SS 		Alonso 	 1m 36.381s  SS
Hamilton 1m 36.330s SS 		Webber 	 1m 36.466s  SS

Compounds used: Medium / Super Soft

Temperatures 		Ambient   Track		Weather
PPM - Practice 3 	22C 	  35C-37C 	Sunny
PM - Qualifying 	23C 	  40C-41C-40-C 	Sunny