Saturday, October 29, 2011

Formula one race India Qualifying Teams and driver India quotes


HRT's Narain Karthikeyan and Daniel Ricciardo on outpacing the Virgins in Q1; Michael Schumacher on how vibration at the rear of his Mercedes saw him miss out on the top-ten shootout; Ferrari's Felipe Massa on breaking the front suspension of his Ferrari and crashing out in the dying moments of Q3; and Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel on securing his 13th pole position of the season. All 24 drivers and senior team personnel report back on Saturday's action…

Toro Rosso
Jaime Alguersuari (10th, Q3 - 1m s)

"I am very happy, especially for the team as we are both in good positions and Sebastien was really fast, right from yesterday, when I had some problems. Today he drove a brilliant lap. We solved my problems overnight so that I could also be competitive today. Tomorrow, we have a good chance of doing well starting from these positions and it could be useful in terms of the championship as our main rivals, the Saubers, are starting behind us. Strategy will be important and if we do everything right then maybe we can bring home a big points score. The increase in performance at this point of the season is down to the great job the whole company has done in developing the car. I am hoping for a top eight finish tomorrow."



Sebastien Buemi (13th, Q3 - 1m s)
"I am very happy for the team as they did a fantastic job and I congratulate them and thank them for it. Having both cars in Q3 is amazing. Now, I hope we can have a good race tomorrow, because there are no points for what we did today. The first race at this circuit is bound to be an interesting experience. It was teamwork that delivered today's result, with everyone giving their maximum since we arrived here in India."

Laurent Mekies, Toro Rosso chief engineer
"A great performance from the drivers and the team today means we have both cars in the top ten on the grid for the first time since China. It has been a complicated task managing the situation of having massive track improvement from one session to the next , combined with the fact this is a new circuit for all of us. Our car is definitely getting faster as we approach the end of the season. We were quite happy with the progress we saw in Korea and today's performance is a confirmation that we are working in the right direction. This is good for everyone back at the factory and in the wind tunnel who are pushing hard on the development of the car. Of course, there are no points for qualifying and although today's result puts us in a strong position for the race, there are question marks over what the track conditions will be like and how much tyre degradation we will see. I expect it will be an exciting race for the spectators, with various different strategies coming into play and hopefully we can make the most of our opportunities and secure a good result, on our first visit to this fantastic track."

Sauber
Sergio Perez (17th, Q2 - 1m 27.562s)

"This was obviously a very bad qualifying for me. After our performance in the third free practice this morning we were clearly expecting to do better in qualifying. The key problem was that we couldn't switch on the tyres to get them really to work. Knowing this, and given the fact that I had the grid penalty from yesterday, we decided to put only the used tyres on again in Q2, as it was better to save the fresh ones for the race."

Kamui Kobayashi (18th, Q1 - 1m 27.876s)
"The pace of the car was certainly good enough for Q2, I was convinced about it and I also think our race performance should be alright. However, in qualifying it took me a lot of time to warm up the tyres, and then in the end I was unlucky. I had just started my final flying lap when Felipe (Massa) came out of the pit lane in front of me. Although there wasn't enough time left in the session for him to do another run he didn't give room. I am disappointed with today, but I will keep myself together and have a positive approach to the race. At least I have some fresh tyres left and this circuit offers opportunities for overtaking."

Monisha Kaltenborn, Sauber chief executive
"We are obviously disappointed about the result, especially after free practice went quite well. Today, the whole team was not able to extract the full potential out of the car. The good thing, however, is that both drivers have two sets of new soft tyres left, which will put them in a position to attack in tomorrow's race."

Giampaolo Dall'Ara, Sauber head of track engineering
"Lately we have been falling into a difficult situation performance wise. Everyone in the team, in the factory and at the track has been working very hard to understand and fix these problems we have had since the last race. Despite having reviewed our approach quite a bit, so far it hasn't produced a significant improvement. We are definitely unhappy about the day. Still the race is tomorrow, and we will keep the motivation up and we will try to catch up as much possible."

Lotus
Heikki Kovalainen (19th, Q1 - 1m 28.565s)

"I think I got as much out of the car as I could in quali and it's good to put in a lap like that right towards the end of the run. Honestly, I've been struggling all weekend to find a balance and put heat into the tyres, so to come out on Saturday and hook up a lap within 0.7 of Kamui feels pretty good. As the weekend's continuing the track's getting better and better and I have to say I'm really enjoying myself out there, so tomorrow will be fun, particularly as we've shown recently that we can fight with the cars in front throughout the race."

Jarno Trulli (20th, Q1 - 1m 28.752s)
"I was a bit unlucky with traffic on my quick laps and I think there were a couple of tenths to find but we were pretty close to pushing as hard as we could today in qualifying. We've taken a step forward since yesterday as the times show, but we know our qualifying pace doesn't reflect what we can do in the race so I want to make sure I can get back to the great race starts I'd been making a couple of races back and see where we end up tomorrow afternoon."

Riad Asmat, Lotus Group CEO
"We did okay here. Both drivers have struggled a little with the tyres here but I think our qualifying performance today shows some of the hard work put in last night and this morning has brought us back to where we know we should be. Now we want to maintain the very good reliability we have seen all weekend and make sure both cars finish well tomorrow. I think the race itself is going to be a momentous occasion for everyone involved in the Indian Grand Prix and I hope the fans have something to cheer for, no matter what team they are following."

Mike Gascoyne, Lotus chief technical officer 
"I think we can be reasonably pleased with our qualifying performance here. Our drivers were close to the maximum on their quickest laps and even though they had a couple of issues with traffic and struggled to generate heat in both compounds of tyres, we finished Q1 close to the group ahead. We know we can fight with a number of cars in the race so the aim for Sunday has to be a repeat of our races in Japan and Korea and maintain the strong end to the season we have been enjoying over the last few races."

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