Sat: Red Bull, Williams, Honda, FIndia

Saturday 11th October 2008

Red Bull, Williams, Honda and Force India were the only teams who failed to get through to the qualifying shoot-out in Japan.

Red Bull
David Coulthard: It was very close today. That was one of my better qualifying sessions, each of my laps were very tidy. On the last lap I was quicker going into the final corner, but I seemed to drag more speed going into the apex, which made me very slow down to the start/finish straight. I would love to have got through to Q3, as it would have meant more driving in the car on low fuel, but I don't think there was much more I could have got out of the car with the balance I had."

Mark Webber: I wasn't quick enough today and when you don't get the times you don't go through. I didn't get it together in Q2 and you pay the price. There was more to get from the car, but I over drove on the last sector. It was a shame as I had had a good feeling for the car both yesterday and this morning, but qualifying didn't seem to work out for us today. It will be difficult from there tomorrow."

Williams
Kazuki Nakajima: After a strong run in the practice sessions that was a difficult qualifying, but we did do our best. I don't think that this afternoon's conditions suited the car that much and some traffic interrupted my last run, which didn't help me either. We now need to prepare a good strategy for tomorrow's race."

Nico Rosberg: It wasn't very nice to qualify 15th today, especially having come from Singapore where I finished on the podium, but that's the reality. We've struggled a bit this weekend, but we were expecting to be less competitive here as we just seem to be missing something on these types of circuits. I'm keeping my expectations for the race in check, particularly if it stays dry, but we could have a better chance of doing well if it rains. I'm happy with my qualifying lap though, and Kazuki's been doing a really good job all weekend. He's been a little bit quicker than me and I'm pleased for him as he's in front of his home crowd. But this weekend isn't over yet; we'll see what tomorrow brings."

Honda
Rubens Barrichello: Although my second run today was actually a good qualifying lap, unfortunately we are at the back of the midfield group where just another three-tenths would have been enough to put me in P10. I was already right on the limit with my second run so we had to take a bit of a gamble with the final run and add a little more front wing. Unfortunately this led to the tyres graining by the second sector and I was not able to improve. It's a shame that we were unable to qualify better than this at our home race but we will do our best to make the most of any opportunities in the race tomorrow."

Jenson Button: It has not been the best of days for us today but hopefully the race tomorrow will be better. I have been struggling with the car for the whole weekend and have found it difficult to achieve a good balance. The car was better in the wet this morning, however the bumps and corner apexes are unsettling the car in the dry and we have not been able to resolve this. I had too much understeer on my final run in qualifying today which made the car very twitchy and difficult to get round the corners and I was unable to improve my lap time. It's disappointing but we just have to do our best with the package that we have."

Force India
Adrian Sutil: It was very close again today. I'm quite happy with my performance as I did some really good laps and the last one was particularly on the edge. I don't think there was any more we could do. We were just one second from pole, which was very good and competitive but still not enough. Let's see what the race brings now, we are quick in a straight line and I think there is a chance to make up some places."

Giancarlo Fisichella: I could improve my time quite a lot from the first run, but on my final run I hit some traffic on the out lap and couldn't warm up the tyres in the cool conditions. Unfortunately I locked up into turn one and lost a lot of time there, so even though the rest of the lap was OK it was never going to be quick. It's a shame but we are still very close to the fastest times. Tomorrow's race will be exciting - you never know what the weather will bring, so we'll look to have a good strategy and try to make up places when we can."