Williams pleased with qualifying outcome at Budapest

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Pending of the publication of fuel loads, the AT&T Williams team was pleased with a good qualifying session that positions Nico Rosberg in a competitive fifth position for tomorrow’s race start on a twisty circuit where overtaking is traditionally limited.

Despite finishing the second ‘low fuel’ session in third and thereby making his third appearance in Q3 this year, team-mate Kazuki Nakajima was not able to maintain such strong form into the final top ten shoot-out. He will nevertheless be a strong contender for points, starting Sunday’s race in ninth place.

Nico Rosberg: "From my point of view, fifth place was okay today and gives us a really good chance for tomorrow. Overall, we have been looking good here and my target remains a podium. Obviously we need to see where everyone else is with fuel and we need a good start and race strategy, but I believe we have some real promise. Given all of this, I am looking forward to the race. Most importantly though, I hope that Felipe is alright."

Kazuki Nakajima: "Initially qualifying went well, certainly up until Q2. I was pleased to make it through into the final ten again, but perhaps I didn’t make the most out of the final session. I struggled with tyre warm-up and couldn’t find the lap time. It may make it a bit difficult tomorrow starting from P9, but let’s see what we can achieve."

Sam Michael, Technical Director: "First and foremost, we all hope that Felipe Massa is okay after his incident. We had a good practice and qualifying session and the car has been quick around here all weekend. Our target now is to race for some good points with both cars, although starts will be tricky with the KERS cars around us, but that’s what we will have to deal with."