Hard to predict Sunday’s Monza winner
Lewis Hamilton is on pole with his McLaren, but the Q3 fuel weights published late on Saturday by the FIA revealed that he was in fact the lightest car in qualifying.
Moreover, he will need to stop one more time than his McLaren teammate Heikki Kovalainen, who is fourth on the grid with 30kg more fuel, as well as the nicely placed Brawns, who are even heavier than the Finn and lined up just behind him.
The Brawn drivers' heavy fuel despite solid pace at Monza was a clever compromise, given that the KERS-equipped Kimi Raikkonen (3rd) and McLarens probably would have passed them anyway before the first chicane.
The impressive Adrian Sutil qualified his Force India just behind Hamilton with a slightly heavier car, while the third-lightest car – Ferrari's Raikkonen – duly qualified third. All of the top three will stop twice.
It was also a very good team debut performance for Tonio Liuzzi, just eight tenths from the pace of Sutil's sister car for seventh on the grid, but with a fuel load that is 25kg heavier.
The Red Bulls have heavy one-stop fuel loads, but to make the strategy work they needed to qualify higher than the fifth row.
Team boss Christian Horner said Monza is a circuit that "doesn't best suit the characteristics of our car".