Webber Happy to Outqualify Jaguar Duo

Australian Mark Webber enjoyed a promising first qualifying session and revealed he was happy to be in front of both the Jaguars.

The Minardi driver, in his first ever Formula One Grand Prix, qualified in 18th position with his Asiatech-powered PS02, finishing ahead of Eddie Irvine and Pedro de la Rosa in the Jaguars.

Webber, however, admitted that the green cars would have probable gone faster than him, had the rain not hit the second part of the session.

"It turned out not too bad for us today," said Webber. "It was good to outdo the Jaguars, even though they only had one run, but that's part of the game â€" they should have had two, but they didn't. I think that everybody knows they could have gone a lot quicker with more running in that session but the rain came halfway through.

"We made a plan to do two runs before the track even got wet. In the end, we had two runs in nice conditions, so the team did a good job."

Webber's teammate Alex Yoong could not match the Australian's pace in today's session, setting the 21st quickest time nearly 1.5 seconds behind Webber.

"It was unfortunate with the rain, as I managed to do only one run this afternoon," said the Malaysian. "I feel just a bit disappointed I didn't go quicker, but at least we qualified. After the last couple of days, which have been spent sorting out some normal 'new-car' issues, I am happy with the qualifying result."