Button 'Pleasantly Surprised' by BAR's Pace

Briton Jenson Button said he was surprised at the speed of his Honda-powered BAR in today's first qualifying for the Spanish Grand Prix.

Button, who finished in a strong fifth position after outqualifying his BAR teammate Jacques Villeneuve by a large margin, is confident of repeating the feat in tomorrow's grid-deciding session.

"I'm very pleased with fifth today," said the BAR driver. "This morning I had a car that was a little bit too twitchy at the rear in the high-speed corners and I was warned that we wouldn't be able to get on top of that. We made some changes though and they seemed to do the trick, so I'm pleasantly surprised.

"It just felt like a very clean lap in which everything came together. A start like this gives you the confidence that the car is going to be stable for final qualifying and the race, so I'm very happy. Things are looking good for the rest of the weekend so I'd like to think that top six is a possibility on Sunday."

Canadian Villeneuve was unable to match the pace of his younger teammate, finishing nearly a second behind Button. The 1997 World Champion, unlike the Briton, was not happy with his car's handling and finished down in 12th position.

"The car has been very hard to drive all day but it didn't feel like a particularly bad lap, so it's a little bit disappointing," he said. "On long runs we were quite competitive but we just don't seem to have been able to make new tyres work for us today.

"Jenson's time showed that the car is quick but we have some work to do this evening to understand why we haven't been able to get the best out of it today."