Mercedes Benz

OFFICIAL PRESS RELEASE

Montréal, Canada, Jun 12, 2010

A below par qualifying performance from MERCEDES GP PETRONAS today saw Nico Rosberg and Michael Schumacher qualify in tenth and thirteenth places respectively for the Canadian Grand Prix at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal.


Using the prime tyre for their only run in Q1, Nico and Michael progressed easily to Q2. Michael missed the cut for Q3 for the first time this season with his fastest time, set on prime tyres on his second run, only quick enough for thirteenth place.

Nico went through in seventh position but struggled with the options on his quick laps in Q3 and qualified in tenth place.

Drivers - Car No. - Chassis No. - Practice 3 - Q1 - Q2 - Q3
Nico Rosberg - 4 - MGP W01 / 02 - P18 - P4, 1:16.350 - P7, 1:16.001 - P10, 1:16.071
Michael Schumacher - 3 - MGP W01 / 01 - P4 - P10, 1:16.598 - P13, 1:16.492

Weather - Overcast
Temperatures - Air: 22-23°C / Track: 29-31°C

NICO ROSBERG
“That wasn’t a great qualifying session for us today. We have a good car here this weekend but unfortunately we couldn’t get the tyres to work properly this afternoon. That was the big issue for us today. The harder tyre wasn’t too bad in Q1 but we struggled with the option later on and there was just no more lap time to be had. It is very disappointing to be starting in tenth place but anything can happen in the race so we can only look forward and take advantage where possible tomorrow.”

MICHAEL SCHUMACHER
“I am obviously disappointed after today’s qualifying. We simply did not have the balance or grip and overall we had a lot of problems with braking and handling. The car was just not performing as we expected. We had similar issues yesterday afternoon and we made some changes after second practice. This morning, the changes seemed to have made sense as our position was reasonable but this afternoon, I was facing similar issues again. It’s difficult to understand the reasons at the moment but we will look deeply into it now and find a good strategy for the race tomorrow.”

ROSS BRAWN
“A very disappointing qualifying session for us today, particularly as I was quite encouraged by our performance yesterday and this morning. However when it came to qualifying, we just weren’t able to put our laps together. We tried both the prime and option tyres but finding the performance seemed to get away from us. There was very little difference between the tyres and ultimately we struggled to get the best out of them.”

NORBERT HAUG
“Not the best possible result for us today. We certainly didn’t extract the maximum out of our cars and didn’t use the tyres in the best possible way. But tomorrow we will possibly be in a better position.”









* Official photos and details courtesy of MERCEDES GP PETRONAS *

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