Nico Rosberg on pole position for Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

Rosberg, quickest on Friday, set the best time of the weekend so far with a lap of 1:41.856 to finish 0.281 seconds ahead of Hamilton.

A sixth consecutive pole position for Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg means Hamilton hasn’t prevailed in qualifying since September’s Italian Grand Prix, though he will end the season with a tally of 12 poles to Rosberg’s seven.

The Briton, who wrapped up the title in Texas last month, lapped the Yas Marina circuit with a best time of one minute 43.754 seconds.

Force India driver Sergio Perez was an impressive third fastest despite brake problems which ended his night early. Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg, the Williams of Felipe Massa and Valtteri Bottas, and Toro Rosso’s Carlos Sainz completed the top ten. He has started the last five races from pole and, having won the last two races in Mexico and Brazil, is gunning for a hat-trick of wins.

“It’s not a revival, I haven’t reinvented anything”, he said.

The Lights went down on Sunday and Hamilton made one of the starts of his career, shooting into the lead before the first corner, a place that would later be uncontested for the Championship leader.

Finn Kimi Raikkonen of Ferrari qualified third on the grid for Sunday’s race behind the two Mercedes, as they achieved another front-row lockout, after his team-mate, the German four-time champion Sebastian Vettel, had failed to progress from Q1.

Rosberg denied there had been anything drastic in his change of fortunes, and believes he had been closer to Hamilton than the results otherwise indicated. He was eliminated from the session along with Fernando Alonso – whose vehicle acquired a puncture on it’s final run – Marcus Ericsson, Will Stevens and Roberto Merhi.

“We’ve been working really hard to make some changes and we had to take something off the vehicle, but Nico was just really quick today and he did a really great job in Q3”.

The second session had begun in a light-hearted way with Vettel out of the pits before radioing back saying: “I think I forgot something this morning”.

With half an hour remaining, the Spaniard was forced to stop his auto on circuit with an apparent engine issue.