European GP Preview Quotes: Michelin

Pierre Dupasquier, motorsport director: "We know the Nurburgring well and have achieved some good results here in the past. The circuit features a varied range of quick, slow and medium corners and tyre manufacturers have to deal with a number of interesting challenges in the course of a single lap. The weather adds a few variables, too. Rain is always a possibility and at this time of the year the track temperature could be anything between 15 and 40 degrees. We know what it takes to succeed here, though. We proved that last season when Kimi Raikkonen qualified his McLaren on pole position and Ralf Schumacher won for Williams."

Pascal Vasselon, F1 programme manager: "We finalised our tyre options for this race a couple of weeks ago, because there hasn't been time to test since our tremendous victory in Monaco last Sunday. We will have three dry-weather compounds available and these all come from the softer end of our range, because the Nurburgring isn't especially abrasive. It is what I would call a 'balanced' track. The loads on the front and rear tyres cancel each other out during the course of a lap so the wear rate tends to be very even."