Australian GP: Sauber Friday qualifying notes

Nick Heidfeld and Heinz-Harald Frentzen in 12th and 13th places respectively after today's first qualifying session for the Australian Grand Prix, which means they will start tomorrow's grid-deciding qualifying session in ninth and eighth positions.

Nick Heidfeld:

"I lost some time this morning with a few electronic problems, including a false alarm with the dashboard, and with things the way they are now any loss of time is going to hurt you. Taking that into account, I was pretty happy with the way things went this afternoon. I made a couple of little mistakes, but the balance of the car was better and overall I really enjoyed the single-lap qualifying."

Heinz Harald Frentzen:

"When we warmed the cars up this morning the team discovered an electronic problem on my initial chassis, C22-02, so I switched to the spare car, 03. This afternoon that car was a little bit oversteery and that was why I had that wobble at the end of the first sector. For sure it cost me a little bit of time. But qualifying was okay for me. It's important to put on a good show for the people, and I think we did that. "

Peter Sauber (Team Principal):

"The new qualifying mode gave us all a very positive experience today. It ran smoothly, gave the crowd a good show, and was good for Formula One. We all now appreciate just how little time it leaves for preparation however, and we have learned now how best to organise ourselves for the future."

Driver (Chassis) - Free practice - Qualifying
Heidfeld (C22-01) -1:27.918s, 8th - 1:27.510s, 12th
Frentzen (C22-03) - 1:28.207s, 12th - 1:27.563s, 13th
Spare (C22-02)

-sauber-