Formula 1 news

Williams team hoped for better qualifying

Following yesterday's tyre-related incidents in free practice, the Michelin-shod teams contested today's qualifying session under guidance from the French tyre manufacturer, even though the problem wasn't one which had affected the BMW WilliamsF1 Team. Nick Heidfeld and Mark Webber qualified 9th and 15th respectively for tomorrow's US GP.

Mark Webber commented about his qualifying today: "It was a reasonable lap and I could not have got much more out of it. We have done as much as we could to prepare the car for the race and tonight we will again go through all our data. The tyre situation is obviously an issue at the moment, even if we didn't experience any problems. However, I have been through a similar situation before at Le Mans and it's important that the right decision is taken for all concerned. I am sure that Michelin will find a good solution in order to guarantee safety and a good race for everyone involved, included the pubic, of course."

Nick Heidfeld said about his run: "Qualifying didn't go as planned and I am not happy with my lap. The car was quite difficult to drive because there was very low grip. It was a lot better yesterday but this morning we struggled and again the same happened in qualifying. It is a bit of an unknown territory what we have entered in consequence of the tyre issue and this has probably also affected our performance today. However, we must say we haven't experienced any problems with our tyre so far this weekend."

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