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Japanese GP: Post Qualifying press conference

NEWS STORY
06/10/2012

Sebastian, your fourth consecutive pole here, you must love this place.
Sebastian Vettel: Yeah, it's not bad. I'm very, very happy with today's result, I think we had a very, very smooth qualifying session, nearly perfect, so we couldn't really ask for more. The car felt fantastic from the start. We didn't really have the best start to the weekend; yesterday morning I wasn't very happy but then we seemed to get it better every time we go out, so very pleased with the result, very happy, the car feels fantastic around here and I was able to pick up a little bit overnight and it came together nicely and now obviously we hope for a very good race tomorrow.

It's the 50th anniversary for Suzuka and it's a circuit that everyone seems to adore driving around. What's the best part of the circuit?
SV: I think you have to say the first sector, up the Esses, obviously we don't have that kind of combination in Formula One elsewhere. I think it's unique. I think this place in general is quite special with all the fans around the track. When I was walking into the garage you can obviously see Turn One, Two, Three and the grandstands mostly and you see a lot of people. It's just, for us, nice to see the excitement people have for Formula One and the support we get. I think they are very crazy - in a positive way - so it's nice coming here and wonderful to drive the circuit. The rest of the track is very enjoyable: The Degners and then Spoon is very special: you always lose the car a little bit, just when you come off. The lap I had in qualifying in the end was just right in those places, so I was very happy.

Mark, great result for the team, Red Bull Racing, you seem to have made real progress.
Mark Webber: Yeah, it's been a good weekend for us so far. Seb and I had a clean run in Q3 when it mattered at the start there. And two pretty big laps from both of us. Obviously Seb got me a bit, so that was a good lap from him. But to be this much further up for us, obviously we've had a rough run with qualifying of late, particularly my side with penalties and bits and bobs. It just makes the race much more difficult: you have to start doing wacky strategies and stuff like that. So, I am happy to be on the front row and looking forward to a good result tomorrow. Like you say, for the team it's just a great tonic for them, at this point in the championship to have the cars towards the front again.

Jenson, third in qualifying but obviously with a five-place grid penalty.
Jenson Button: That hurts a little bit. Today was good. This morning in practice I wasn't that happy but we made some good improvements for qualifying. For me both laps I did in Q3 were good. I was happy with the laps, really enjoyed driving around here, it's always great with low fuel and new tyres - new soft tyres. It was a lot of fun but we're just not quick enough. I wouldn't know what to put my finger on, where that four-tenths is. A good qualifying for us, just a pity we're starting back in eighth. This place is such a nice place to fight for a win; it's going to be very difficult for me tomorrow but never say never. There's always possibilities and I think we'll have a good race car also.

Press Conference

So Sebastian, I guess one of the main factors tomorrow is going to be all about tyres, have you got enough sets left? New tyres, new softs?
SV: Yeah, obviously we didn't finish the run in Q3, so saved a little bit there, saved a lap, didn't push to the end. Before that we had a very smooth session in qualifying in general. We saved as many tyres as we can and I think we have a pretty good car, the balance felt very good in qualifying so I was very happy with the laps I had every time and yeah, all in all I think we should have a good race car as well tomorrow. I think we were able to improve the car from yesterday to today which also helps us on the long run and with tyre consumption. But you never know until you find out. I think we've seen a lot of races this year where probably we expected something, and people expected something, other teams had expectations but the last ten laps everything turned around. We have to stay focussed and see what we get from start to finish.

I guess you were OK in traffic, because particularly in Q1 a lot of people were complaining.
SV: I was very lucky, I saw a couple of incidents on the screen but I think we found a good gap, and I needed only one lap, which obviously helps. So that was good - it doesn't always go that way. So, it was helping to save tyres, I'm not sure if we're going to use that one again - but still it's good to get through without any trouble.

Mark, on that last lap, did you have yellow flags at Spoon?
MW: Yeah, I had to back-off for the lights and the flags. There was no car there when I got there, so it was very, very close. Obviously JB was behind me and I saw he was still committed to his lap with the DRS etc., so obviously the lights were just cleared for him. Would have been nice to have a look at the last chicane, would have liked to have got that a little bit better. I was down a sniff into Spoon but… the hairpin was tricky for us today, trying to get the hairpin a little bit better would have been nice but in general the first sector was very strong, and for both of us to have a strong car here, when it really mattered, to put ourselves right towards the front of the grid, on the front row, is something we're really, really happy with. We can really race from there and have a good grand prix tomorrow.

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