Massa grabs pole position in Spain

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BARCELONA, Spain -- Brazilian Felipe Massa gatecrashed world champion Fernando Alonso's home grand prix party by snatching pole position from the Spaniard in the final moments of a thrilling qualifying session on Saturday.

Alonso looked set to claim first place on the grid in his McLaren until Massa produced a blistering lap of one minute 21.421 seconds at the Circuit de Catalunya.

Alonso still had time to register one final effort but came up three hundredths of a second short with Massa's teammate Kimi Raikkonen taking third spot.

Britain's rookie sensation Lewis Hamilton completed the front two rows with just over three tenths of a second separating the top four.

Massa, who has claimed pole position for three grand prix in a row, said he was determined to produce a quick lap after being held up on his first attempt.

"It was very very tight, I just managed to make a good lap without too many mistakes after my first lap which was a disaster," said Massa.

Alonso said the race was likely to boil down to a battle between the dominant teams in Formula One this season.

"I think we saw yesterday and today it will be a very close fight as we expected. Qualifying was confirmation of how tight things are between the Ferari and McLaren teams," he said.

Alonso, Raikkonen and Hamilton are all level at the top of the standings on 22 points with Hamilton the first driver in Formula One history to finish the first three races of his world championship career on the podium.

Massa, who was claiming the sixth pole of his career, is five points adrift.

Poland's Robert Kubica was fifth in a BMW ahead of Italian Jarno Trulli in a Toyota.

German Nick Heidfeld in the second BMW and Finn Keikki Kovalainen in a Renault share the fourth row.

Veteran Briton David Coulthard in a Red Bull and Italian Giancarlo Fisichella in the second Renault rounded out the top ten.

The session began again in hot and dry conditions with the air temperature recorded at 27 degrees Celsius and the track at 48.

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