German GP Ferrari Saturday notes

Michael Schumacher "I was hoping to be closer to the quickest times after this morning, but this is the situation we now face and we have to live with it. However, I prefer to have the Williams eight tenths in front of me than Coulthard. I have to ...

Michael Schumacher
"I was hoping to be closer to the quickest times after this morning, but this is the situation we now face and we have to live with it. However, I prefer to have the Williams eight tenths in front of me than Coulthard. I have to look at the situation in terms of the championship. I would of course like to win the race, because I have not won here so often. But you can only do your best with what is available to you. There was nothing wrong with the car, we were just slower than the other guys. We have performed normally, if you look at our gap to McLaren, but Williams has done a much better job than usual. Most of the difference has come from the tyres. This is one of two tracks which is pretty much tailor made for our rival's tyre company. In the race, we must remember that to finish first, first you have to finish. So let's wait and see what happens."

Rubens Barrichello
"I was not able to get the most out of my car in this afternoon's qualifying session, especially when it came to getting a good top speed for the straights. Now we must take a close look at the telemetry data to understand what happened. On my fourth and final run, I could not improve as the track had got slippery and dirty after a couple of cars had gone off. As for tomorrow's race, I'm still fairly confident, as the grid position is not that important when it comes to deciding the final result, as we saw last year, when I won the race having started from eighteenth place."

Jean Todt
"This qualifying session was different to the ones we have grown used to witnessing this season. Actually, it is only the second time that neither of our drivers has made it into the top three. We knew it would be a fight between three teams and that it would be very difficult to get pole position. I thought we would be a bit higher up the grid. Today, the team which has shown itself capable of winning on some tracks, has dominated. Tomorrow, bearing in mind the situation in both championships, it will be important for us to bring home as many points as possible."

Ross Brawn
"Not such a good qualifying session as we did not get the car quite right on all parts of the track. We had some problems with wheels locking under braking, which we did not experience this morning. We will have to investigate the cause. It's obviously very close behind Williams and I think it will be a very tough race tomorrow. If Williams don't make a mistake, we will be racing against McLaren tomorrow. If that is the case, then beating them will be our priority. It will be tough for the tyres in the race in this heat, as we have seen some degradation on the rears. But it's not an abnormal situation. There is not a lot you can do here in terms of a clever strategy, as there are only 45 laps."