Saturday: Satisfactory Qualifying for Marussia
The Marussia team is quite pleased with the performance of its two drivers during the Japanese Grand Prix qualifying as they both beat a Caterham. A slight disappointment, however, to see Charles Pic outpaced by an HRT. But Glock and Pic are rather confident for the race because the MR01 is always better in race conditions.
Timo Glock – 21st and 20th [18th on the grid]:
« All’s well that ends well, but free practice 3 was a difficult start to the day, a bit like in Singapore. Here, we had an oil pressure issue with the engine and I couldn’t do many laps, which was a bit of a shame because we needed to fine-tune our settings with the change in track temperature; our car was quite sensitive to this parameter. We had a good discussion with my engineers about what needed to be done and I think all the changes made worked well. I had only one fast lap in my second stint and I made a small mistake in the first sector, but the car was good. Placing ahead of a Caterham despite the challenges I faced makes me happy and we’ll see if we can do better in the race. »
Charles Pic – 22nd and 22nd [21st on the grid]:
« I am quite happy with my qualifying lap, and I achieved the goal by getting ahead of one of the Caterhams. That being said, I think there is more to come from the car and extracting this performance will be our main focus for this afternoon and tonight. At the moment, we seem to be slightly less competitive than in Singapore, so we will use the time before the race to see what improvements we can make for tomorrow. »
The positions on the grid are provisional and may be subject to change depending on penalties applied following the qualifying session.
