WilliamsF1 Team Reactions Bahrain Qualifying

By WilliamsF1 Team
March 12 2006

Reactions ... Bahrain GP Qualifying

Mark Webber: Chassis: FW28 03 / Engine CA2006/26 – 1st GP: Session Times: 1:33.454 (8th) 1:32.309 (9th) 1:33.006 (7th) "Not a bad effort at all. We have still a lot of work to do but we could not really have asked for much more today, considering a few teams have been testing on this track in the last two weeks and have of course better an understanding of the conditions here. We will learn a lot more tomorrow in the race, let’s see how it goes. The new format of qualifying is a bit of a mess for the drivers and the teams in terms of organization. We have to see how it looked on TV, though."

Nico Rosberg: Chassis: FW28 04 / Engine: CA2006/25 – 1st GP Session Times: 1:32.945 (4th) 1:32.620 (12th) --- "I am not too unhappy about today’s result, even if qualifying has been a bit of a chaos, due to the new format, but I still enjoyed it. I could have done a little bit better, maybe not much. I was pushing very hard and spun on my fast lap, towards the end of the session, but it can happen. The fact I didn’t make it to the final part of qualifying means I have some small advantage for tomorrow, since we will be able to put in the car as much fuel as we like. I am now looking forward to a reasonable race."

Simon Corbyn, Head of F1 Race Engineering, Cosworth: "I'm pleased to say Cosworth had no engine problems throughout the day. It was exciting to see a new format to qualifying. The new system was quite a challenge, particularly for the drivers, but both did well and although Nico didn't ultimately make it into the final session, he did put in an extremely good lap in the first session."

Sam Michael Chief Operations Engineer WilliamsF1 "It was an interesting afternoon with the new qualifying format for the first time and a credit to all the parties - Williams, Cosworth and Bridgestone - to prepare well for all the changes. All the teams adopted many different strategies for qualifying and it will be interesting to assess the approaches taken. Nico was a little bit unlucky he didn't make it to the final session, but he's not in a bad place to start given our long run potential. Mark did a good job to finish seventh. We have strong long run performance and it will be interesting to see how quick everyone actually is tomorrow and what strategy teams choose."