Q & A with Williams's Sam Michael

Sam Michael: Yeah, it was good to get three points in the bag. Obviously we would have hoped for a lot more especially given our pace in qualifying. But sometimes you have to take what you can get. Nico drove well. We could have done a better strategy, because we did a strategy to get ourselves on the front row in terms of pitstop lap, after having such a competitive Q2.

Then we got traffic in Q3 and we didn't get the laptime. So being in sixth with that fuel load was not ideal, because everyone around him had more fuel, so it was quite difficult to make it work. But anyway, three points is three points.

Q. Is it encouraging that the pace of the car has stayed up there?

SM: It has. We are happy with the progress. Obviously we have to keep pushing so it stays like that. But we are still frustrated that we didn't get more points. Not this weekend, because three points is three points which is fine. It's up until now that we haven't... In Melbourne we were four tenths off pole and then Malaysia, Shanghai and Bahrain were six or seven tenths, and Barcelona it was three tenths and here the quickest in Q2, which is the best reference.

Q. What do you think is the reason you haven't scored more points?

SM: I think we just haven't done a good enough job as a team. I don't mean the drivers specifically, I mean everyone. You can have a car that can be in some races second or third quickest and probably the worst case we have been the fourth quickest team, and yet we are seventh in the championship. Seventh in the championship is your measure as a team. Anyway, we are pushing hard to try and correct it while there still a reasonably small gap from third downwards.

Q. Do you think the front row was possible?

SM: Yeah, I think if Nico had got his laps together in Q3, because he had traffic, definitely.

Q. Is the performance at Monaco due to the circuit or due to progress?

SM: It's not just Monaco where we have been reasonably competitive. We are more competitive here than at other tracks, but that's just down to set-ups and things that we run in Monaco. I don't expect to be quickest in Q2 in Istanbul, but we do expect to be within half a second.

Q. Is it easier to get all things right during a GP weekend with a quick car or having a sharp team with a slow car?

SM: It's always better to have a fast car, because on average throughout the season you'll always overcome it, unless you are totally incompetent.

Q. How did you find the performance of the option tyre?

SM: It was actually fine with what we did with the strategy, but we managed out strategy because we saw what had happened to the others in the first stint. So we went very long in the middle stint. We probably didn't need to go as long as we did because when we went for the option we didn't have any problems with it.

Q. Jenson has won five out of six races, in the wet, in the dry, on fast and slow tracks. Do you see any factors that might stop him?

SM: They are clearly developing their car pretty well. They have scored on all tracks now. Most of the cars are there as well. Even Williams this year, at some of the tracks where we have been weak in the past, like Barcelona, was our most competitive race. The characteristic of the cars have changed.

Q. The developments the teams are making are still quite big.

SM: Yeah, it's still big steps. That means that the teams who are struggling at the moment could easily catch up quickly. The cars are still very undeveloped compared to the end of last year, so that's why it's happening.