Greater Noida: It was a contrasting sight, at the Buddh International Circuit, when the qualifying rounds of the inaugural Indian Grand Prix came to an end, on Saturday.

Seconds after Red Bull driver Sebastian Vettel emerged from the pit after claiming the pole position, he was mobbed by a couple of hundred fans, who wanted to have a glimpse of the world champion from close quarters.

Standing on the other side of the paddock was Formula One legend Michael Schumacher, who finished a poor 12th in the qualifiers. The seven-time world champion cut a lonely figure as he slowly walked into the Mercedes team building.

In Sunday’s race, Schumacher will start at the 11th position as Renault driver Vitaly Petrov, who actually finished one position ahead of the veteran German, would be down by five places because of the penalty he received in the last race in Korea.

But then, the frenzy that one saw around Vettel was very much justified. With his spectacular performance on Saturday, the double world champion gave Red Bull a record 16th pole position in one Formula One season. He clocked 1 minute 24.178 seconds on the 5.125 km circuit to rank ahead of McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton (1:24.474) and Mark Webber in the second Red Bull (1:24.503).

Webber will start Sunday’s race next to Vettel in the front row because Hamilton loses three places on the grid for a yellow flag offence in Friday’s practice.

Vettel now has 13 poles in 2011 and Webber three as Red Bull got the qualifying record. The previous top mark was 15 poles achieved by McLaren, Williams (twice each) and Red Bull last year.

With two races to go, Vettel is now just one short of equalling Nigel Mansell’s 1992 Formula One record of 14 pole positions. Ayrton Senna (1988 and 1989) and Alain Prost (1993) are the other F1 drivers who had managed 13 poles in a season.

Vettel now has 28 career poles to his name and stands joint sixth in the all-time standings alongside five-time world champion Juan Manuel Fangio.

“The car was fantastic since yesterday and throughout qualifying,” said Vettel later. “In the end there was a little bit left in the first sector. I’m extremely happy to be in India and it’s good to be here. It will be a very interesting race on a challenging circuit,” added the German ace.

However, it was a disappointing day from the Indian point of view as Narain Karthikeyan was handed a five-place grid penalty for impeding Michael Schumacher’s car during the qualifiers. It means that the Indian will have to start his home Grand Prix from the last position on the grid on Sunday.

Karthikeyan had qualified in the 22nd position but will now move to the rear of the 24-car field. The incident happened in the first qualifiers when Schumacher was probably having his best lap but at turn 10, Karthikeyan was found guilty of blocking the German’s way at turn 10.

The other Hispania driver Daniel Ricciardo received a five-place grid penalty for an unscheduled gear box change and will start at 22nd,

Nico Rosberg starts seventh for Mercedes, followed by Adrian Sutil for Force India, and Toro Rosso pair Sebastien Buemi and Jaime Alguersuari — the Italian team with both cars in the top 10 for only the second time this season. Though the other Force India driver Paul di Resta will start at 12th, Sutil said he was happy with his team’s performance.