Giancarlo Fisichella put his Force India-Mercedes on the pole for the Belgian Formula One Grand Prix, the best qualifying result ever for Force India.
Force India, which has yet to score a point in thirty races, seems finally to have found the pace. Fisichella’s previous best qualifying run for Force India this year had been thirteenth.
“I’m so happy about it,” Fisichella said at the post-qualifying press conference. “I need to thank the team because they did a fantastic job. I am really, really happy, and confident for tomorrow.”
Possibly motivated by rumors that Ferrari is considering him for a driver’s spot next season, Fisichella put in two very fast laps in the final few minutes of qualifying. His car had not been performing well the day before, but the team fixed all the problems for today’s qualifying session.
“I didn’t expect to be on pole position,” Fisichella explained, “especially after yesterday. There was a lot of understeering and the measurements on the downforce were not good. This morning we went through the problems and the car was much better and in the qualifying session the car was even better than what I expect. I was able to be the quickest in Q1, the fourth quickest in Q2, and pole position in Q3,” [referring to the three qualifying sessions.]
Toyota, another team which has struggled this year, also had a good day, with Jarno Trulli second and Timo Glock second.
Jarno Trulli said, “It’s a mystery,” why the Toyota was so fast in qualifying. “We haven’t done anything to the car compared to the last few races, and suddenly here we are extremely competitive. It’s great for the team, for the engineer, for all my mechanics. We are going through a difficult moment, because we don’t understand why sometimes we struggle so much and sometimes we are just so quick like today. It’s a very good day, I am very confident for tomorrow; I think I’m going to have a good race tomorrow.”
BMW, which has announced its withdrawal from Formula One after this season, suddenly found its way, with Nick Heidfeld placing fourth and Robert Kubica sixth. As Nick Heidfeld put it, “It’s obviously very important for everybody within the team. We said, after BMW decided to pull out, BMW wants to leave on a high, and not with what we’ve shown in the first couple of races. We are working at the moment on securing the team; it’s difficult to say what going to happen at this moment in time it’s great that we can show a good performance.”
“On the soft tire it just doesn’t feel right,” Button said. “I don’t know what the reason is, why I can’t get any more out of the car but when you’re four-tenths off your teammate, there’s something not right there. We’re normally very close. Rubens [Barrichello] was quick on the Options (the alternative softer tires) and I wasn’t. We need to look at the reason why.”
McLaren, which was slow for the first half of the season and suddenly came to life for the past few races, was back to its old problems. Defending champion Lewis Hamilton and teammate Nico Rosberg both failed to make the final qualifying session.
| Starting Grid—Belgian Grand Prix | ||
|
| Driver | Chassis-Engine |
| 1 | Giancarlo Fisichella | Force India-Mercedes |
| 2 | Jarno Trulli | Toyota |
| 3 | Nick Heidfeld | BMW-Sauber |
| 4 | Rubens Barichello | Brawn-Mercedes |
| 5 | Robert Kubica | BMW-Sauber |
| 6 | Kimi Räikkönen | Ferrari |
| 7 | Timo Glock | Toyota |
| 8 | Sebastian Vettel | Red Bull-Renault |
| 9 | Mark Webber | Red Bull |
| 10 | Nico Rosberg | Williams-Toyota |
| 11 | Adrian Sutil | Force India-Mercedes |
| 12 | Lewis Hamilton | McLaren-Mercedes |
| 13 | Fernando Alonso | Renault |
| 14 | Jenson Button | Brawn-Mercedes |
| 15 | Heikki Kovalainen | McLaren-Mercedes |
| 16 | Sebastien Buemi | Toro Rosso-Ferrari |
| 17 | J. Alguersuari | Toro Rosso-Ferrari |
| 18 | Kazuki Nakajima | Williams-Toyota |
| 19 | Rene Grosjean | Renault |
| 20 | Luca Badoer | Ferrari |
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