US GP: Spyker Saturday qualifying notes

The Etihad Aldar Spyker Formula One Team will start tomorrow's USA Grand Prix in 21st and 22nd positions. Adrian Sutil and Christijan Albers completed six and seven laps respectively on the soft Bridgestone Potenzas in the first 15-minute Qualifying segment to end the session just 0.4secs apart.

Both drivers set their fastest times on their first flying laps in the session after small problems on the second runs stopped any improvement. On a circuit that favours a high top speed, a good Qualifying result was going to be challenging, but for the third consecutive race the team was less than two seconds from the pole position time.

Adrian and Christijan now go to tomorrow's 73 lap Grand Prix optimistic of making up on their respective grid slots with a strong race pace.

Adrian Sutil:

"The first run was OK. I had some traffic on my first lap, but the second lap was better. Then the last run with the new tyres was difficult as I had some problems with the front tyres and had a lock-up and went wide in the first corner. In general the session was OK, but of course could have been better. With the long straights and the high-banked corners here it should be a fantastic race tomorrow, as compared to other tracks, it should be quite easy to overtake other cars."

Christijan Albers:

"It was not really a bad Qualifying; we did our best. Everyone is quite close together and it's not easy to do a quick lap time. I was looking for a tow and I didn't have one, but I had already lost some time before I arrived at the first corner, which was quite a shame. Hopefully tomorrow we will have a good car and be able to race the cars in front as we did in Montreal."

Mike Gascoyne, chief technical officer:

"A slightly disappointing Qualifying session where both drivers did not improve on their second runs at the end of the session. Although I don't think this would have changed our position, we certainly would have been closer to the cars in front. Overall I think we will have a decent race pace though and will be able to stay and race with the group ahead. We just have to get the right strategy for tomorrow's race.'

Adrian Sutil
Chassis: F8-VII/03
Q1: 21st, 1:14.122 (6 laps)

Christijan Albers
Chassis: F8-VII/02
Q1: 22nd, 1:14.597 (7 laps)

-credit: spyker