Force India baffled by lack of speed

Although the Silverstone-based squad had insisted their goal was Q2, neither Giancarlo Fisichella nor Adrian Sutil managed to get close to making it through.

The Italian came closest, but was still a second off the pace and finished in 19th, with Sutil in 20th.

Gascoyne said the team were having problems with their tyres, but was not sure what was the reason for it.

"Qualifying and really the whole of today has been very disappointing for the team," said Gascoyne.

"Adrian only got his first run in on a dirty track and then had traffic on his second run, before a brake problem on his last outing, which meant he couldn't set a representative time.

"Giancarlo was slightly more fortunate in that he got in some reasonable runs, but the car hasn't had the same grip we had yesterday and basically, fuel corrected, we were about a second slower than we were able to be yesterday.

"It is very difficult to understand why we have struggled so much with the tyres today, but we have to work on it tonight and look to have a better race tomorrow."