Formula One news

Mixed fortunes for Honda drivers

The Honda Racing F1 Team experienced mixed fortunes today in the qualifying session for tomorrow's Hungarian Grand Prix. Jenson Button made it through to Q2 once again and will start tomorrow's 70-lap race in a creditable 12th position. Rubens was pushing a little too hard on his flying lap which forced a mistake under braking. He will start the race from 18th place.

"I'm happy to have qualified in P12 today after a good lap on the final run in Q2 pushed me a few places up the grid," Button said. "We've definitely made some progress with the new developments to the car and in particular the new rear suspension is working well and this has enabled us to improve the car step by step over the weekend. I got the most out of the car today and it's encouraging to see we were only three-tenths away from the top ten as it has been a while since we were that close. I'm on the dirty side of the grid, which is a disadvantage, but I am sure we can have a good race tomorrow from here nonetheless."

Team mate Rubens Barrichello was obviously less satisfied with his qualifying performance. He said about his 18th grid position: "Choosing which tyre to run was a really tough decision today and it was a difficult qualifying session. I felt the supersoft option tyre was working slightly better with the car so I stayed with that for my final run. After a good first sector, I went in too quick for turn 11 and made a mistake which ruined my lap. With that went the chance to progress to Q2 and the time from my previous run puts me in 18th place on the grid. The lap was going quite well but a mistake at turn 11 meant that I had to abort the lap. I have to settle for 18th place today and turn my focus now to the race."

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