Webber gives his views

For BMW WilliamsF1's Mark Webber the last week has seen him come away with what he saw as a disappointing third place finish in the Monaco Grand Prix and now he has set the third fastest time in European Grand Prix qualifying. On both occasions he has had to deal with the fact that his team-mate Nick Heidfeld has finished better than him. In Monaco Nick was second and in qualifying at the Nürburgring Nick secured pole.

Mark was interview by Australian television, Ten Network, and was first asked to talk about the difficult start that the team had to deal with as they went through Friday practice for the European Grand Prix but how they bounced back to do very well in qualifying.

Mark explained things by saying: "Normally Friday is the best day for us to do all our tyre comparisons between the soft and the that's the best one to do the compare on the hot track and yeah I had a spin very early in the session and Nick lost his gearbox as well so so both of use were on very limited programmes there and we had to work very hard with Michelin on Friday night to get to the bottom of which tyre we would take for today and the race itself. So far so good and yes we have recovered like you say, both cars within the first two rows. We can get away well and do a good race from there and see how it unfolds from there. Kimi is very strong and McLaren are still the form team in terms of racing but we are definitely on the front foot from Monaco and so far so good.

As for what strategy he was running, was it the same as Nick's, Mark was reluctant to divulge what his strategy for today's race is. All Mark would say was "Well you will see it tomorrow." When asked again he only added: "I was very happy with my lap put it that way."

As for whether or not the changes in the qualifying rules had affected his  strategy on the weekend Mark believed that it would but again it would be a case of seeing how things turned out on Sunday.

Mark added: "We will see tomorrow. I think it will. We believe it might, with the
way we have no second qualifying now it's hard to actually judge where people are because don't run low fuel anymore, everyone is running race fuel straight away in the first and only qualifying sessions so we will only get to see the way people have done their strategy in the first stint tomorrow and then after that we will have an idea then the true picture will evolve over the next few meetings but ah this is clearly the first race obviously with one qualifying session and is very similar in some ways to last years regulation but we didn't have new tyres in the pit lane in the race so we still have the one set obviously.

As for the race at Monaco much was said about Mark's disappointment with his third place result. As for how he felt Mark said that he was disappointed but the race was rewarding in other ways.

Mark said: "Of course I was disappointed to be honest, I think personally I wanted to get more out of the weekend I felt that ah I had done enough to probably get a position further up ( second position ) but obviously at the last round of stops things changed that and that was something which was of cause out of my control but it's a team sport and it was a gear team result with second and third for Nick and myself after a bit of a rough start to the season, so ah qualifying all the practice the race in general went very well for me I felt that I was driving well and that the maximum result for me was quite an easy second place in Monaco but it did not turn out to be the case.

I got third which was a bit of a frustrating podium for me been my first one but you have to look back on it and say you couldn't do any things at Monte Carlo. You know its an hour and forty five hour and fifty race around there and there is absolutely no let up its qualifying from start to finish and the barriers you are skimming them on every lap so there is zero room for error so it was a very rewarding race on that front."

Did Mark have any hard feelings about the pit stop that would see Nick ahead of him. Mark said no as he knew the teams reasons behind the timing of the pitstops and that it was nothing personal.

Mark said: "I have spoken to Sam about it, we even spoke about it in depth on the in lap as well as after the race and ah it was Sam and Rob's call to do that with Nick and there were reasons behind that to help the team. They were worried about Nick falling into another group of cars and for him to finish sixth or seventh, so in general it was a team decision to help us overall and there was nothing personal against me."

As for the turn around in the teams performances Mark agreed that it had been a huge effort on the part of the team.

Mark added: "A huge amount, that's one of the biggest things that can win you lap time in these cars is load and efficient downforce, ah but as well power. You have got to keep trying to find more power and things like that so in general we have done quite a good job I feel on the aerodynamics side and everyone one at Grove are working incredibly hard to ah close the gap McLaren which is the form team at moment.

As for the FW27's very public lack of straight line speed Mark would agree that they were struggling in this area. He also spoke of the difficult time that he has been having with his starts.

Mark said: "Yeah we are (lacking straight line speed). I think it is clear for all to see that we need to win a little bit of straight line speed and that comes with aero efficiency, also horse power. Ah we need to probably have a little bit more ponies as well as efficient load. So both those things together help end of the straight in a formula one car.

As for his starts Mark added: "We will try again tomorrow and try and get away, and we know why the runs to the first corner are particularly difficult for us and there is no real quick fixes so we will do our best tomorrow.

Mark was then questioned as to the future of the WilliamsF1 and BMW partnership, which has been a taking point amongst the media,  Mark indicated that such decisions came down to team management. But his remarks were a bit odd in the context of the WilliamsF1 team having a contract with BMW until 2009.

Mark said: "Well instability is never ideal is it for any big company and Williams is clearly a team that wants to win and so does BMW and I feel that there is a big chance that we could stay together next year but that is obviously up to Frank, it's Franks team and that I am going to be driving flat out what ever engine I have got in the back."

As for the good results that the team has achieved of late Mark was realistic enough to know that this race was a new event.

Mark concluded by saying: "This team is really realistic, its history on Monday. It was only a week ago of course but ah that result does not count for anything now. It's a new venue and we have to get on with it here and ah we have done the first part of it and laid the foundations and get the race right and try and get some more points to close the gap to Toyota if we can."