Qualifying for the Japanese GP was run under good weather with a dry track. The first car out onto the track would be Minardi's Alex Yoong. He would post a time of 1m:38.700, which was not going to be enough to qualify. BAR's Jacques Villeneuve would take to the track early clearly having to make up for lost time in his troubled practice sessions.

Jacques would set a time of 1m:34.8, 3.837 secs ahead of Yoong and quicker than his practice times this morning. Jaguar's De la Rosa would take to the track, moving into second 0.413 behind Jacques. Both McLaren's would come out on new Michelins, joined by both BMW WilliamsF1 drivers.

Kimi would se a time of 1m:32.699, while Juan Pablo would do a 1m:34.023. Ralf would perform better than Juan Pablo, but he was still slower than Raikkonen at T2. In the end he post a time of 1m:33.065 and move into second. So with nearly half the session complete the order was Raikkonen, Coulthard, Ralf, Juan Pablo, Irvine, Heidfeld, Button, Massa, Villeneuve and Salo.

Ferrari's Rubens Barrichello would take to the track and he would take the lead by 0.002 secs. Team-mate Michael , but Michael Schumacher would go even quicker with a time of 1m:31.825. Renault's Jarno Trulli's first lap would see a sixth fastest time, ahead of Jenson Button. Juan Pablo was to slip back to seventh.

After making changes to his front wing Juan Pablo would take to the track pushing hard. His time was a 1m:32.5 and he would move into second. The first sector was average, but then Juan Pablo really had a great lap. But the session would be brought to a halt with a red flag as a result of an accident by Allan McNish.

McNish was able to get out of the car but he was very shocked by the accident. His accident was a very big one, but luckily he hit the barrier with the rear at the exit to the 130R corner. His car was completely destroyed in this massive shunt. The Toyota ended up flying over the tyre wall, landing on the other side. The car did not flip which allowed McNish to climb out of the car unaided. McNish was taken to the circuit medical facility for a check-up but under advice from Professor Sid Watkins he would not take part in the rest of
qualifying.

With twenty minutes remaining the order was Michael Schumacher, Juan Pablo, Barrichello, Raikkonen, Coulthard, Ralf, Trulli, Salo, Villeneuve, Irvine, Massa, Fisichella, Heidfeld, Sato, Button, de la Rosa, Panis, McNish, Webber, and finally Yoong.

All the teams had around forty five minutes to wait for the resumption of qualifying as the barriers were repaired. Upon resumption of qualifying Rubens Barrichello would quickly set a time of 1m:32.581, 0.7 behind team-mate, to go third.

Juan Pablo would take to the track for another flying lap, but was 0.63 secs behind after the first sector. Despite this he would improve his time and move into second 0.6 secs behind the fastest time. Ralf would quickly pass this mark moving into second with a 1m:32.444. But just as quickly we would see Rubens move into second. The next driver to try to beat Michael's time would be David Coulthard. He would set a time of 1m:32.088 to go second.
Both BMW WilliamsF1 drivers would return to the pits to make preparations for their final laps. At this stage the two WilliamsF1 drivers were fourth and fifth with Ralf faster.

With nine minutes left the order was Michael Schumacher, Coulthard, Barrichello, Ralf, Juan Pablo, Raikkonen, Trulli, Salo, Button, Fisichella, Irvine, Massa, Sato, Villeneuve, Heidfeld, Panis, de la Rosa, McNish, Webber, and Yoong.

It was going to all come down to the final minutes to decide pole. The BMW WilliamsF1 Team was busy making changes to the cars of Ralf and Juan Pablo. Irvine would lose control of his car and he has to get out of it as was to stall the engine. Now the big names would take to the track with Barrichello 0.023 ahead of Michael at T2. He would set a time of 1m:31.749, 0.239 behind his team-mate but good enough for second.

Michael would take to the track joined by both WilliamsF1 and McLaren drivers. But no driver could improve allowing Michael to keep his pole position. Behind the two Ferrari's came Coulthard in third ahead of Raikkonen, Ralf and Juan Pablo. Juan Pablo had to break off his last run after running wide and getting onto the grass. Qualifying was very much the case of the big three teams dominating..