Jolyon Palmer endured a frustrating start to his 2013 campaign as a throttle issue on his Carlin GP2 car left him struggling for pace in qualifying, meaning he starts from the rear of the grid for tomorrow's (Saturday) Feature Race at Sepang, Malaysia.

Drivers were greeted with hot, humid conditions for the start of the 30 minute session with Jolyon unable to show the front running pace he'd demonstrated during pre-season testing due to a flat spotted first set of tyres.

After pitting for fresh rubber midway through the session, the 22-year-old Brit emerged back on track with eight minutes remaining. However, a sticking throttle issue prevented him from improving further leaving him a frustrated P23. A post-qualifying penalty for Johnny Cecotto though sees him gain one place to 22nd.

Speaking afterwards Jolyon said: "I had a problem with a sticking throttle that was costing me quite a lot of time. I had a similar problem in practice as well so overall the day has been severely compromised. Hopefully we can still salvage a point or two this weekend but it won't be easy."

Meanwhile, Rapax's Stefano Coletti will start on pole with ART's James Calado alongside him on the front row and Felipe Nasr, also driving for Carlin, in third.

Round one of the season takes place at 03:15 (UK time) with full coverage, including live timing, on Jolyon's website.

GP2 Malaysia, qualifying results:

1. S Coletti, Rapax, 1:44.280s
2. J Calado, ART, +0.004s
3. F Nasr, Carlin, +0.008s
4. F Leimer, Racing, +0.183s
5. S Bird, Russian Time, +0.318s
6. M Evans, Arden, +0.338s
7. R Haryanto, Addax, +0.401s
8. R Binder, Lazarus, +0.407s
9. S Trummer, Rapax, +0.412s
23. J Palmer, Carlin, +1.382s