Valtteri Bottas grabbed his second pole both of his career and this season at the Austrian Grand Prix, just finishing ahead of Sebastian Vettel's Ferrari.
The tension was high going into Q3 with the leading drivers all covered by tiny margins, the Finn would lead by less than half a tenth from the German with a 1:04.251s on the first flying lap.
As they went out for the second attempt in the last minutes, however, Romain Grosjean would stop on the track causing yellow flags and forcing the drivers to abandon their last laps and giving Bottas pole position.
Lewis Hamilton was eyeing the top spot in order to minimise the pain from his five-place grid penalty. That effort was going well, even deciding to use the super-soft tyre in Q2 to change his strategy in the race, but after only claiming third on his first lap in Q3, he made two errors on his second lap meaning he will drop to eighth.
Kimi Raikkonen will move up to third as a result and will be followed by Daniel Ricciardo in the first of the Red Bulls. The Australian producing his best lap when needed to beat Max Verstappen, as the Dutchman ended qualifying by spinning off in the middle of the sweeping chicane at Turn's 7 and 8 but will still start fifth.
Romain Grosjean claimed sixth position in a good session for Haas that was sadly compromised by the problem at the end for the Frenchman and a suspension failure for Kevin Magnussen during Q1 leaving the Dane down in 15th after he had comfortably set a time in the top 10 in that first segment.
The two Force Indias were once again almost inseparable with less than a tenth between Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon. Happily, for team owner Vijay Mallya, Hamilton's penalty sees him drop between the two drivers as Perez starts seventh and the former European F3 champion ninth. Carlos Sainz completed the top 10 in his Toro Rosso.
Nico Hulkenberg was unfortunate to miss out on Q3 in 11th with the Renault driver followed by the McLaren duo in one of their best qualifying results this year with Fernando Alonso 12th ahead of team-mate Stoffel Vandoorne in 13th.
Daniil Kvyat was down in 14th with the aforementioned Magnussen in 15th after the unfortunate failure caused by simply riding the aggressive kerbs on the exit of Turn 3.
Jolyon Palmer's poor pace continued as the Briton was eight-tenths slower than his team-mate and failed to make Q2 in 16th but most disappointing was Williams as their upgrades for this weekend appear to have disrupted the balance of the FW40 and both Felipe Massa and Lance Stroll ended well down in 17th and 18th respectively.
The Saubers completed the grid once again, as the problems at the Swiss team persist. Marcus Ericsson was again the quicker of the two drivers as he and Pascal Wehrlein appear to be becoming the clear backmarkers.
