Formula One news

Mixed day for Renault

The Renault team experienced a day of mixed results in qualifying on Saturday as Fernando Alonso and Nelson Piquet took their R29s to ninth and twelfth positions on the grid. Although traffic affected both drivers, the pairing is still searching for more effective setups ahead of the legendary race on Sunday.

Nelsinho Piquet starts his second Monaco Grand Prix from twelfth

Qualifying in the top ten, Alonso achieved the best side of the fifth row and is looking for an aggressive start in the Grand Prix. "Overall I'm happy with my performance as I did the best I could today," said the Spaniard, who won on the Côte D'Azur in 2006 and 2007. "At the end of the session I was caught in a line of traffic but, honestly, our ninth place reflects where our car is at the moment because I was 12th in Q1 and 9th in Q2 - it's clear that we still need to improve and find more speed."

Pat Symonds, executive director of engineering for Renault

After finishing second practice quicker than his team-mate on Thursday, the final phase of qualifying looked a possibility for Piquet although the Brazilian will be lining up on row six. "I'm not totally happy because my ideal lap would have put me in the top ten," he confirmed. "However, the car wasn't perfect and I didn't have the ideal brake balance, which made it difficult to get the most from the car.

"However, if you had said to me before the weekend that we would have this result, I think I would have been relatively satisfied and starting 12th is not too bad. Now we need to concentrate on making the most of the strategy tomorrow." The French team's engineers will continue working on setup work as post-qualifying analysis reveals more data. "A disappointing qualifying session for us," concluded Pat Symonds, the squad's executive director of engineering. "The car seemed well balanced this morning but this afternoon it lacked that little bit of extra grip that we needed."

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