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French Grand Prix
Qualifying
1 K. Räikkönen 1:16.449
2 F. Massa 1:16.490
3 L. Hamilton 1:16.693
4 F. Alonso 1:16.840
5 J. Trulli 1:16.840
6 H. Kovalainen 1:16.944
7 R. Kubica 1:17.037
8 M. Webber 1:17.233
9 D. Coulthard 1:17.426
10 T. Glock 1:17.596
11 N. Piquet jr. 1:15.770
12 N. Heidfeld 1:15.786
13 S. Vettel 1:15.816
14 S. Bourdais 1:16.045
15 N. Rosberg 1:16.235
16 K. Nakajima 1:16.243
17 J. Button 1:16.306
18 R. Barrichello 1:16.330
19 G. Fisichella 1:16.971
20 A. Sutil 1:17.053

Dismal qualifying for Honda
Today's qualifying session in Magny Cours turned out to be character-building for the Honda Racing F1 Team. A lack of pace meant that Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello were unable to progress through to Q2 and they will line up in 17th and 18th positions respectively for the start of tomorrow's 70 lap French Grand Prix.
"A very disappointing qualifying session today," said Button. "The car was well balanced and we are pretty much getting the maximum performance from it, however unfortunately our pace reflects where we are at this track. My last run was slow as I was called into the weighbridge and then had to wait in the pit box as there was not enough time to go back into the garage before my final run. That meant that my tyres had cooled down which compromised my lap, although I don't think we could have improved enough to go through to Q2 anyway. Hopefully we can be more competitive in race trim but it's disappointing and unexpected as we thought that the car would perform better around this circuit."
Barrichello commented, "A pure lack of performance from the car today. The lap times have been very close all weekend but unfortunately we are at the lower end of the grid. We are really pushing the limit of the car to try and achieve more pace but it is evident from how close Jenson and I have been all weekend that there is no more to come from the car. Having achieved a good balance after practice, it's hard to accept the lack of pace, but we just have to try and do our best from here and see what the race will bring."
Engineering chief Steve Clark added, "Unfortunately, it is not the case that anything went wrong, as such. We felt that we had made good progress overnight and had effectively addressed the handling issues of yesterday. The cars were well balanced with no obvious problems and the closeness of the two drivers reflects the fact that unfortunately that is the pace of the car. As always, the middle order is extremely competitive and we needed 0.3s to make it through to Q2. However, it doesn't seem that we could have found that time in the car today."


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