Disappointment for Williams

The new Williams-BMW partnership got off to a low-key start in Melbourne with drivers Ralf Schumacher and Jenson Button qualifying only 11th and 21st respectively.

Mar 11, 2000, 5:20 AM

Both suffered technical difficulties, while Button was further hampered by a heavy crash in morning practice.

'You know the problem is that one always thinks one could have done better,' said technical director Patrick Head. 'We certainly could have had Ralf in the top ten but he had a problem with the throttle pedal sensor on his car.

'It wasn't really a qualifying session that went our way, but tomorrow we will have two cars on the grid, not as good as we might have expected, but it's a start...'

'I am not satisfied,' said Ralf Schumacher. 'I think that the FW22 and the BMW engine could have shown a better performance.'

BMW Motorsport Director Gerhard Berger was more philosophical however.

'I would say that with Ralf's result we have achieved what we realistically expected and the gap from the top teams is not as huge as we thought,' he said.

'The BMW engine is quite on the pace also with regards to the maximum speed. Not so bad, then.'