Richards Praises BAR's Attitude

BAR-Honda team principal David Richards hailed his team on Saturday after coming through a difficult week to claim third and fourth place on the grid for the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Richards has spent the last week embroiled in contractual dispute with Jenson Button after the British driver announced he has signed a deal to re-join former team Williams next season.

BAR believe they have a firm contract with Button while Williams are confident they have secured his signature, but Richards was delighted to do the talking on the track.

Button qualified in fourth place with teammate Takuma Sato just seven-thousandths of a second quicker to qualify in third place behind the dominant Ferraris of Michael Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello.

"This will not be a team that will destabilised by side issues," said Richards. "We are a racing team and every single man is a solid professional. I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a different atmosphere. But today's performance is a great indication of that and let's try and carry that through to the race tomorrow.

"It is just more focused and more professional if it can be, perhaps a little less jokey. Everyone knows what the objective are and what are goals are and no one has flinched from that."

Japanese Sato backed the attitude of the BAR team after his impressive performance in qualifying.

"It is obviously not exactly the same atmosphere as it was at the last races this weekend but we are very professional people so once we go into the weekend we are absolutely the same as we were working," he said.

"So basically it is no changes and we still discuss with an open manner the data, which is no problem, and obviously he (Button) is very committed and I am very committed, we are pushing each other in that circumstance nothing has changed."