Kubica surprised by strong showing

Kubica, who had qualified in a career-best fourth in France last weekend, continued to show strong form following his return to action after the Montreal crash.

The BMW Sauber driver had missed a lot of running in the morning due to a gearbox problem, and he admitted he did not expect to do so well.

"Qualifying was good, in fact better than we expected and I had a good pace," said Kubica. "We struggled yesterday with my set up, but we changed something for qualifying and it looks like this has made the difference.

"If I was joking I would say we were the first of the B championship. It looks like Ferrari and McLaren here are too far away to fight with them, but it is important to be there if someone has a failure and so we can gain positions"

Teammate Nick Heidfeld was not so happy after putting on his worst qualifying performance of the year, finishing down in ninth place.

He said: "Of course I am not happy. Ninth position is my worst qualifying result this season. I couldn't get the most out of the tyres - neither at the beginning of the lap nor towards the end when they started graining. The balance of my car wasn't bad.

"Compared to yesterday this had already improved for this morning's session, as we identified a set-up mistake we made yesterday. Naturally I hope some cars starting in front of me have to refuel before me, but you can never tell."