Kubica expects to have a difficult race

The Pole, who unlike team-mate Nick Heidfeld is running without KERS because of weight distribution concerns, said that he was surprised to have made it on to the second row of the grid despite carrying a relatively light fuel load.

"I am expecting a difficult grand prix," said Kubica. "The target is fifth or sixth rather than the podium.

"It's different to do one lap than 50 laps, and the race will be more difficult. P4 is much more than I was expecting in qualifying. We were targeting the fourth row rather than fourth place."

Although happy with the pace he could extract from his BMW Sauber over a single lap, Kubica believes that over the longer runs he will be at a disadvantage to the pace-setting cars.

"Better cars will have less tyre degradation because with more downforce they are wearing the tyre less," he said. "The cars which are struggling with the downforce normally have higher tyre wear.

"We are average on tyre wear and grip. Once the grip is going away the car starts to be more difficult to drive."

Despite his strong qualifying performance, Kubica believes that he might have been able to be one place higher had he not lost time on dust kicked up by Nico Rosberg.

"I found a lot of dust put down by Nico in the final sector," said Kubica. "He went wide, it was very dusty and I was just a few seconds behind.

"I picked up a lot of dust on the tyre and lost two or three tenths, which cost one position for sure."