It was an "if" sort of day, along the lines of "if my aunt had balls she'd be my uncle" but all the same, Tonio managed to qualify 13th, splitting the two Red Bull Racing cars.

Tonio Liuzzi: "I have to say I'm satisfied with how this session went, even if we didn't make it through to the final shoot-out. We were really so close, but the rain came at just the wrong time and stopped us from setting a time and before that I had trouble with traffic. If we had left the garage one minute before…who knows? But its clear we had the potential to be in the top ten. The car was much better today, so it will be an interesting race tomorrow as overtaking is difficult here."

Scott Speed: "I had a good start to the session even if as expected it was tough to warm up the tyres. The second run was better still until I lost the car in Turn 14. We're not sure exactly what caused that, maybe it was down to the tyre pressures we were running. Up to that point, I was on a lap that would have easily been good enough for thirteenth or fourteenth place. My final lap was also good enough for fourteenth but I did it crossing the red light. All the same, I think we have a good race car for tomorrow."

Gabriele Tredozi (Technical Director): "A very difficult day with the red flags and rain, but the whole team did a very good job. I'm a bit disappointed for Scott, because his performance was very good too, even if circumstances meant he did not progress to the second part of the session. But the car is fast and has a good balance for the race and we have also worked out a good strategy. The team is coming together and has improved a lot and we have a good basis for the future."

To check out our Melbourne qualifying gallery, click here