Rosberg hails 'super' qualifying

The Williams driver, proving one of this year's qualifying specialists, finished the session in sixth place, but will start from fifth following the penalty to Robert Kubica for his unscheduled engine change.

Rosberg admitted he was surprised to be so high up the grid.

"Today's qualifying was super, it really went well and I am very happy," said Rosberg. "I am a bit surprised as well, to be honest, because I didn't think we'd be so far up as it was very tight to make it into the top ten in Q2.

"We struggled here a bit more yesterday than we did on other tracks but overnight the team did a good job and found all the right solutions. Fifth position on the grid is really fantastic. This puts us in a strong position to be able to score some good points tomorrow."

Rosberg outqualified teammate Alex Wurz once again, the Austrian having to settle for a disappointing 16th place.

"Some of my problem today was with not enough top speed on the straights. Of course this is quite punishing at a track like Spa," he said.

"The engineers will have a look at it. Otherwise we have done a very good job and made real progress from yesterday with the set-up and the car felt good under cornering. We should have a good car for tomorrow even if the start position is not great."