McWilliams vows to race despite crash

The Ilmor rider had a spectacular accident on his final lap of the afternoon, and there were initial concerns that he could have broken the femur that he fractured during his testing crash at Jerez in November again.

However, after walking from the circuit ambulance to the medical centre, McWilliams is hopeful that he has escaped the crash with just some severe bruising. However, he is due to undergo an X-ray in Qatar this evening to check that he is fully fit to race.

"I'm relieved that all I appear to have is some bruising," said the Ulsterman, who eventually qualified 20 th. "I can bend my knee and I'm able to put weight on both legs.

"I'm feeling a little weak and lucky. Very lucky. I should be okay tomorrow and I have every intention of racing."

With McWilliams feeling that he did not show what the Ilmor bike is capable of thanks to his off, teammate Andrew Pitt did not have much better luck after needing an engine change.

"It wasn't a great day for me, we had an engine change and then there was a fuel leak which hampered our overall progress today," said Pitt, who qualified one place behind his teammate.

"The major positive that we can take from today is that we made some good steps forward on the tyre front - we established which tyre not to use for the race. We will use a harder compound to deal with the high track temperature.

"I'm still experiencing quite a lot of chatter but I know the guys are working on that - I'm not expecting miracles overnight but the team are working very hard to give Jeremy and I the most rideable bikes possible for the race tomorrow. "