Hamilton's McLaren teammate Heikki Kovalainen took third, with Felipe Massa (Ferrari) having to settle for fourth position.

The title rivals moved to the front as soon as they started their first runs, quickly pushing previous pace-setters Kovalainen and Kimi Raikkonen (Ferrari) back to third and fourth.

Hamilton was immediately quicker than Massa, lapping in 1:12.278 compared to the Brazilian's 1:12.427.

But they then found it hard to improve on those times, both making minor errors in the middle sector on their next laps. Hamilton would improve his first sector time on a subsequent outing, only to lose nearly two seconds with another mistake in sector two, while Massa had fewer dramas on his next run but was still a few fractions slower than his earlier mark.

When they switched to soft tyres for the final qualifying simulations, it was McLaren who fared better. Kovalainen briefly went fastest, before Hamilton beat his time by 0.013 seconds, despite encountering traffic in the middle sector.

Massa was within a few thousandths of a second of Hamilton's pace for the first two-thirds of his own soft tyre lap, but lost out in the final sector - crossing the line exactly one tenth slower than his championship opponent.

But then in a repeat of yesterday afternoon's session, Alonso vaulted from the midfield with his last gasp low fuel run and outshone the title rivals. The Spaniard's 1:12.141 beat Hamilton by 0.071 seconds, pushing Kovalainen and Massa back to third and fourth.

Toro Rosso had a very strong session, challenging for the top six throughout and eventually taking fifth and seventh places with Sebastian Vettel and Sebastien Bourdais. They were split by BMW's Nick Heidfeld.

Mark Webber took eighth for Red Bull, ahead of Nelson Piquet's Renault and Jarno Trulli's Toyota.

Raikkonen ended up only 12th in the second Ferrari, having failed to improve on his soft tyre run.