Formula One news

Honda misses out on top ten

Honda will start tomorrow's 66-lap Spanish Grand Prix from just outside the top 10 after Rubens Barrichello and Jenson Button qualified in 11th and 13th positions respectively. 

 "My final Q2 lap felt perfect and I'm pleased for myself and the team that we could put in a good time," said Barrichello. "Unfortunately we were just not quick enough to be in the top ten, but we are knocking on the door. I'm very pleased with my lap, and whilst it is frustrating to be so close, I am happy with our performance today and we are looking good for tomorrow."

Button commented, "Qualifying was just so close today and it was a tough session for us. A lot of our work this weekend has been trying to understand the aero on the car as I missed out on testing last week. On my last run, I took some front wing off as the rear end was twitchy and I had too much understeer. This was really useful as we found it made the rear end more stable and didn't give me any more understeer, so it's a question of trying to understand the car and catching up on the time that I missed last week." 

Honda head of engineering Steve Clark added, "The top 10 times were all very close and Rubens was just 0.065s away from making it into Q3, so a top 10 place was certainly within our grasp. We have certainly improved the car with our latest developments, however the same is true of our near competitors and the goalposts are moving all the time. We know Barcelona very well as the teams test here all the time. The field is very tight and with it being so close we are probably seeing the absolute pace for the first time this season."

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