Belgian GP: Qualifying notes - Mercedes

01/09/2012

Michael Schumacher and Nico Rosberg qualified in 13th and 18th positions respectively today after a disappointing qualifying hour for Mercedes AMG Petronas at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit.

Nico did not progress from Q1 having missed much of the final practice session this morning. Michael got the most out of the car in Q2 but was not able to achieve higher than 13th place. Nico will incur a five-place penalty as his gearbox was changed prior to qualifying.

Michael Schumacher: Well, what a pity today. I am really sorry for my fans but I am afraid I have to say that I got pretty much everything that we could from today. The car was not quick enough, and especially in the mid-sector we were too slow. We now have to take it as it is and try to do the best we can in the race tomorrow. We will have further steps coming soon, so we will go on fighting.

Nico Rosberg: This weekend isn't really running to plan so far. Starting from the back of the grid tomorrow is really disappointing, although I had no chance to prepare my car due to the gearbox problem this morning. So it took a bit of a time to find the right set-up in qualifying and it didn't work out well at the end. I hope I can gain some positions in the race but I'm not overly optimistic as our car is not one of the quickest on this track. I will definitely push hard.

Ross Brawn: It's been a disappointing day all round for us. Qualifying was tough, and it proved pretty tricky to get the tyres in the right operating window. In fairness to Nico, he didn't have much of a chance as he missed most of P3 this morning, the only opportunity to have had some time on a dry track. Michael had a reasonable run and that was about the best we could have achieved with the car that we have at the moment. Clearly it's not good enough and we will continue working very hard to make improvements.

Norbert Haug: Michael got everything out of the car that was possible today. It did not help us that the rain yesterday meant that no preparation for today was possible but of course that applies to everybody. On top of that, Nico did not get any running in this morning's only dry session due to a gearbox problem which will give him with a five place grid penalty. This is of course not the start that we have wished for after the summer break. Our target is to do a better job tomorrow.

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