Heidfeld Confident after Promising Qualifying

German Nick Heidfeld will be hoping to return to the points after a promising performance in Saturday's qualifying for the French Grand Prix.

The Sauber driver, who lies in seventh position in the Championship after a strong start of the year, has being unable to finish the last three races and has not scored a point since he finished in sixth place at the Spanish Grand Prix in May.

But after qualifying in ninth place at the Magny Cours circuit on Saturday, Heidfeld admitted he was confident for Sunday's race.

"All through qualifying we made little adjustments to the car which improved it each time," said Heidfeld. "My last run was clear and clean, and I'm satisfied with ninth place because qualifying was very difficult here. We struggled a bit with set-up yesterday, but now I think we are in very good shape for the race."

Kimi Raikkonen was for once unable to follow his teammate's pace on Saturday, the Finn not comfortable with his Sauber. At the end of the day, Raikkonen qualified in thirteenth place.

"I wasn't quite happy with the balance of my car this afternoon, especially in the first corner which is very quick," said Raikkonen. "The car was just moving around a little too much on the track."