The good news just kept on coming for Brawn GP, as the new-for-2009 publishing of the starting fuel loads of the 20 cars revealed that not only had they bossed the field in qualifying, but they had done it with more fuel than most.
Of the cars that made it through to the final part of qualifying, only Timo Glock's since-penalised Toyota ran with a heavier car than the pair of Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello, who will begin the race with around 20 laps worth of fuel onboard (first lap pile-up induced safety car periods notwithstanding). The cars directly behind them are all significantly lighter, with the fourth place starter Robert Kubica lightest of all at 650kg, a revelation that just about entirely explains the BMW's sudden leap from nowheresville to the second row of the grid.
Sebastian Vettel and Nico Rosberg are both around three laps lighter than the Brawn machines in 3rd and 5th, while somewhat shockingly, the Ferrari pair are among the lightest of them all, indicating that the pace of the Scuderia machines isn't quite as much as many had suspected.
Further back, Nelson Piquet Jr will have an easy excuse for his dawdling early race pace, starting as the heaviest car at a very precise 694.1kg, while the penalised Lewis Hamilton will start on a surprisingly light fuel load, despite taking a gearbox change and a grid drop. Presumably the team are gambling on a combination of the KERS device and early-season attrition to boost Hamilton to somewhere half-decent.
| Starting Fuel Loads | |||
| Driver/Car | Fuel | Grid Pos | |
| 1 | Robert Kubica (BMW) | 650kg | 4 |
| 2 | Felipe Massa (Ferrari) | 654kg | 6 |
| 3 | Lewis Hamilton (McLaren) | 655kg | 18 |
| 4 | Kimi Raikkonen (Ferrari) | 655.5kg | 7 |
| 5 | Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull) | 657kg | 3 |
| 6 | Nico Rosberg (Williams) | 657kg | 5 |
| 7 | Jarno Trulli (Toyota) | 660kg | 20 |
| 8 | Mark Webber (Red Bull) | 662kg | 8 |
| 9 | Sebastien Bourdais (STR) | 662.5kg | 17 |
| 10 | Jenson Button (Brawn) | 664.5kg | 1 |
| 11 | Rubens Barrichello (Brawn) | 666.5kg | 2 |
| 12 | Timo Glock (Toyota) | 670kg | 19 |
| 13 | Sebastien Buemi (STR) | 675.5kg | 13 |
| 14 | Fernando Alonso (Renault) | 680.7kg | 10 |
| 15 | Adrian Sutil (Force India) | 684.5kg | 16 |
| 16 | Kazuki Nakajima (Williams) | 685.3kg | 11 |
| 17 | Giancarlo Fisichella (Force India) | 689kg | 15 |
| 18 | Heikki Kovalainen (McLaren) | 690.6kg | 12 |
| 19 | Nick Heidfeld (BMW) | 691.5kg | 9 |
| 20 | Nelson Piquet Jr (Renault) | 694.1kg | 14 |
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