Shanghai - Championship leader Lewis Hamilton will start Sunday's Chinese Grand Prix in pole position after outpacing the two Ferraris of Kimi Raikkonen and Felipe Massa in Saturday's qualifying session.

The Briton, who is hoping to become the youngest-ever world champion, posted a time of 1 minute 36.303 seconds for the 5.451 kilometre-long track.

Raikkonen was .342 seconds slower than Hamilton in the McLaren- Mercedes and will share the front row on the grid with him.

Massa, who is Hamilton's main competitor for the championship, will start from the second row on the grid alongside Spain's Fernando Alonso in a Renault.

Heikki Kovalainen had the fifth-fastest time, while Mark Webber was sixth-fastest.

The Australian will only start from 16th position though after an engine change resulted in him being placed 10 places back.

BMW-Sauber's Nick Heidfeld will start from the third row, while Sebastian Vettel in a Toro Rosso and Jarno Trulli in a Toyota make up the fourth row.

The second Toro Rosso of Sebastian Bourdais and Nelson Piquet Jr in a Renault complete the top ten.

Championship contender Robert Kubica in a BMW-Sauber struggled to get through to the second round and managed only the 15th-fastest time - one place above those who did not advance.

The Pole, who needs to finish three points above Hamilton in the race to stay in contention for the title, was only slightly better in the second session and finished with the 12th-fastest time and will start from the sixth row on the grid.

Ahead of the 17th of 18-season races, Hamilton leads the standings with 84 points from Massa, who has 79. Kubica has 72.

Ferrari has a seven point advantage in the consturctors' standings over McLaren. The Italian team is on 142 to the 135 that McLaren has. BMW is third with 128 points. (dpa)