Malaysia Friday quotes: Honda

"We have made good progress over the day and I'm happy with the car and the balance, which is positive. It's always difficult to know where we stand on a Friday versus the rest of the field but I'm hopeful that we can continue to improve the car through this evening and tomorrow."

Rubens Barrichello - 11th: "I was quite happy with the set-up of the car on old tyres this afternoon and we achieved some good work on the long run pace. However, I am still struggling with the set-up on new tyres so we need to look at the data overnight and improve on that for tomorrow.

"We had a good weekend in Melbourne but it is important to keep our feet on the ground and continue to work as hard as possible. The car is very driveable and providing we get the set-up right for qualifying tomorrow, we are aiming to make it into the top twelve. If we can achieve that, then I am confident we can have a good race from there."

Steve Clark, head of race & test engineering: "We came to Malaysia expecting very high temperatures but in fact we have not yet seen the exceptionally hot weather we experienced in Melbourne. For the car it is the temperature that is critical for reliability; the driver has another issue - that of very high humidity, which is more difficult than heat alone since the body's cooling is less effective. Dehydration is a real issue during the race and they have to work hard at managing their fluid intake. The heat and the severity of the newly resurfaced track are proving a challenge for the tyres and we are seeing both fronts and rears overheating.

"So far the results look quite encouraging. The balance of the car is not yet where we want it to be so we can still improve. However the pace is quite encouraging, particularly on race fuel loads. Whilst it is perhaps optimistic at this stage in the car's development, we hope to be challenging for a place in the final qualifying session tomorrow."