Stewards have confirmed that, having failed to qualify within 107% of the fastest time set in the first phase of qualifying, neither Hispania Racing driver will start the Australian Grand Prix.

The news comes after a weekend that can be best described as shambolic, HRT having arrived in Melbourne hopelessly unprepared. Failing to get on track during the first practice session the car turned a wheel for the first time when Tonio Liuzzi completed a single installation lap at the end of the second session yesterday afternoon.

However the team's woes continued as Liuzzi crawled to a halt without completing a lap in final practice this morning. The gearbox selected neutral as the Italian braked for turn three, sidelining him and the car for the remainder of the hour-long session.

Then, with just minutes on the clock, Narain Karthikeyan finally got his first taste of the car, an installation lap which verged on dangerously slow and forced several drivers to take hasty avoiding action as the Indian completed his first lap in a Formula One car in six years. He managed five laps with a fastest time of 1:41.554, which would have seen him fail to qualify within 107% of the inaugural Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne in 1996.

Heading in to qualifying with a total of seven laps under their belt little was expected from the Spanish outfit. However, to their credit both drivers emerged from the garage and completed eleven laps during the first period.

As the session wore on and both drivers became more comfortable with the car performance improved, Liuzzi shedding eight seconds off his initial time to set a 1:32.978 while Karthikeyan could only manage a 1:34.293.

It wasn't enough however, with the benchmark set at 1:31.266 Liuzzi found himself 109% off the pace, while Karthikeyan was 110.5%.

Provisions within the rules allow stewards to grant teams the right to race under exceptional circumstances such as changeable weather or reliability problems during qualifying. The rule is not designed to allow cars which aren't up to the demands of Formula One to participate, and the FIA duly enforced the regulation.

It was the correct decision, and indeed the only one the stewards could make. The 'out of the box' performance from the Hispania is encouraging, and given reliable running in Malaysia it is quite likely it will make the grid.

However the disparity between cars in Sepang is generally greater than it is in Albert Park, so while early signs suggest the car isn't as uncompetitive as Melbourne might suggest the team still has its work cut out.