McLaren takes conservative approach

Raikkonen confessed that he took his qualifying run "pretty easy", in order to ensure that he set a clean lap and claimed a reasonable position for tomorrow's final qualify, which determines the race order.

"Inevitable on the first day of running the circuit cleans up throughout the session and the pace quickens, which couples with a somewhat conservative approach to Froday's qualifying saw us finish seventh and eighth," said Dennis. "However as always it's tomorrow and the race that count."

Raikkonen's conservative approach follows his off in qualifying for the Spanish Grand Prix, which forced him to start from the back of the grid. "Of course I would have liked to be further up the grid," he said. "I took it pretty easy in order to get a time and tomorrow we have more time to work on the set-up and should be able to further improve the car. Today's qualifying is just a little practice before the real thing."

Coulthard was disappointed with his qualifying run, especially because he set a faster time in this morning's practice session. He said: "At the first two corners I felt that I was not really on the limit and as a result at the third corner, I tried a bit more and ended up with lots of oversteer. However we will see what happens tomorrow as I know there is still a couple more tenths to be found."