Minardi qualifying gamble pays off

The track will be damp for the start of the race at least, and Minardi boss Paul Stoddart claims more rain showers are on the way. Minardi's strategy of aborting its qualifying laps on Saturday afternoon meant that the cars did not have to go to parc ferme, and thus they were the only team able to work on their cars and start with a wet set-up and a fuel load of its choice.

Stoddart explained: "We had three plans and discounted one of them very quickly, the one everyone thought we were going to do, which was the hot lap to get a very good position. We discounted that very quickly.

"Plan two, the one that says historically Melbourne sees a pretty good chance of a Safety Car on the first lap, was to run with low fuel and hopefully qualify 10th -12th. But that's the worst place to be if something goes wrong.

"Jos Verstappen actually went out with a full tank of fuel and had it rained, which it threatened to do during qualifying, we might have got out, finished the lap and stayed on a one-stopper, which would only work for a wet race. Strategy three, the primary one, was to do what we did, simply come around, pits, get our cars all weekend and put a full wet set-up on. Yesterday it was 65/35 against us. Today it's 50/50, so we'll just wait and see."

Verstappen will start the race from the pits, however, after hitting trouble on his out lap.