British GP: McLaren Saturday qualifying notes

Team McLaren Mercedes drivers Kimi Raikkonen and David Coulthard will start from third and 12th position for tomorrow's British Grand Prix. Kimi set a time of 1:21.695 whilst David did 1:22.811.

Kimi Raikkonen:

"I had already changed out of my overalls before the end of qualifying as I wasn't expecting to do the top three interviews. I'm very pleased with my lap as we were really struggling with the balance yesterday. We improved the car throughout practice this morning and even made a few more adjustments after warm up and the car felt really good. I'm confident of a good result tomorrow."

David Coulthard:

"I was really struggling with the balance of the car. As a result I ran wide at Stowe, locked up the front under braking at Club and lost a lot of time. I was generally not hitting the apex of the corners, and we tried to make a few more changes after warm up but they didn't work out. It will be a challenging race for me in front of my home crowd. However I have started in similar positions before and still managed to finish in the points or even on the podium"

Ron Dennis:

"Concentrating our pre-British Grand Prix testing schedule on Barcelona definitely made some of the initial set up work more difficult. Kimi's third place is a practical demonstration of the importance of a balanced car. David's lack of balance made life somewhat difficult for him. However both drivers and the team will approach the race with a view to maximise our points score."

Norbert Haug:

"A solid job by Kimi, and his third place is a good basis for tomorrow's race. It will be interesting to see who will be out for how many laps before the first pit stops. A shame that David will start from 12th position, but I'm sure the race will see him performing well. "

David Coulthard: MP4-17D 08
Kimi Raikkonen: MP4-17D 09
T-car (Kimi): MP4-17D 07
Spare: MP4-17D 06

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