Lucky Strike BAR Honda's German Grand Prix weekend got off to a disappointing start today for Jenson Button and third driver Anthony Davidson.

Anthony suffered a gearbox problem in first free practice which caused him to stop out on track towards the end of the session. He was however able to maintain his fastest lap of the morning, ahead of local hero Michael Schumacher.

This afternoon brought further frustrations with an engine problem for Jenson Button. He ended the day 4th but the necessary engine change this evening will now relegate him 10 places on the grid for Sunday's race. Anthony Davidson and Takuma Sato finished the session 6th and 7th on the timesheets.

Jenson Button: "We had a good morning, so it is very disappointing that I will lose 10 places on the grid as a result of my engine change. The programme ran according to plan and the car was very consistent, but it will be difficult and very competitive in qualifying tomorrow so we have a great deal of work to do now. The tyres worked well and were consistent during the long runs, which is good news for the race. I will obviously be targeting a points finish on Sunday but the task has been made a lot more difficult."

Takuma Sato: "We have had a good day today and the car looks very consistent on long runs. We should be quite a bit stronger here than we have been in the last few races and I hope we can get back to the sort of form we had in Indy and return to the podium. The package we have here is better and I am looking forward to setting up the car for tomorrow and the race."

Anthony Davidson: "Generally it's been a reasonably good day for me. I stopped the car on the circuit this morning after we identified a potential gearbox problem, which was a great shame considering the progress we were making. I was very pleased to finish first in the first session and disappointed to end this afternoon's session early. I think we have seen some encouraging signs for the weekend ahead and the car is looking competitive but it is obviously very frustrating that Jenson will have to lose ten places. I'm sure that he has a strong enough car to put up a good fight though."

David Richards, Team Principal: "We started the weekend on an extremely positive note with the announcement of the long-term extension to our partnership with Honda. This is excellent news for the team and it gives us the stability we need to pursue our common objective of winning the world championship. After such an encouraging start to today it is disappointing that we have encountered such frustrations on-track and Jenson will lose 10 places on the grid as a consequence of his engine problem."

Geoffrey Willis, Technical Director: "The car has been working well and we have been competitive throughout the sessions. Despite completing our full running plans today, Anthony had a gearbox problem at the end of the first session and Jenson suffered an engine problem at the end of the second session. Anthony stopped the car out on track as soon as he felt the problem and we will be making some changes tomorrow to avoid a repeat of this problem. Unfortunately we will have to change Jenson's engine which will clearly penalise his chances in Sunday's race. Judging by the closeness of many teams today, this weekend will be very challenging for us."

Shuhei Nakamoto, Engineering Director, Honda Racing Development: "Unfortunately we have identified a problem with Jenson's engine, which means that we will have to change it tonight. However, the pace of all three drivers has been quite good today and we have managed to complete over 70 laps, so I hope he will be able to fight for some points on Sunday."