23/08/2008
NEWS STORY
Positive qualifying for the BMW Sauber F1 Team - Robert Kubica qualified third for the maiden event at the Valencia street circuit. Nick Heidfeld finished qualifying for the European Grand Prix in eighth.
Robert Kubica: This was a very good Qualifying for the team and me. After some unlucky races lately the pace of the car here in Valencia is not that bad. However, there is still a small gap to Ferrari and McLaren. Qualifying went pretty smoothly, with only the weather a bit unstable. In the end there were only some rain drops in the second qualifying session, but this did not affect the result. The choice of tyres was pretty clear for me by yesterday: I went on the harder compound in Q1 and on the softer compound in Q2 and in Q3.
Nick Heidfeld: Qualifying eighth is not perfect, but I think it was about the maximum possible today as the fuel load comes into play. In Q1 I thought it was déja-vu when Timo Glock was in my way. Our team informs us on the radio how many seconds behind us a fast car is, and when we have to let somebody overtake. Apparently this isn't the case in every team. I was afraid my qualifying would be ruined, but luckily I was able to do a second lap straight away and it was good enough. Q2 was fine, as I was third fastest and could see the pace was there. Generally speaking I'm a lot happier with my car today. On Friday I was struggling a lot, but we have made a lot of changes since.
Mario Theissen (BMW Motorsport Director): On this new and demanding track Robert had a great qualifying again and fought his way through to P3 on the grid. Nick improved in the second part of qualifying and made it into Q3 with the third best time overall. His last lap wasn't perfect as he lost some time in the second sector. Anyway, eighth is good. What these positions are worth we shall see tomorrow during the first pit stops. We had no technical problems during qualifying.
Willy Rampf (Technical Director): This was a very exciting qualifying. In the first part there were some rain drops, and in the second part the times were close. It's positive that we were able to get both cars into the top ten qualifying. Nick drove a very fast lap in Q2 and was able to qualify easily for Q3. Robert also had a very strong performance. Starting from P3 he is in a very good position for the race, and Nick will also have his chances. I'm pleased all the hard work we have done since the race in Hungary has paid off.