By Ian Lockwood
June 8 2008

A minor crash in the final moments of Q2 prevented Mark Webber from taking up his rightful place in yesterday’s final qualifying session; nevertheless the Australian will still start today’s 70 lap Canadian Grand Prix in Montreal from 10th position. Webber had already set the fifth fastest time of the session and was safely through to Q3, but was looking to improve again on his final lap when he ran a fraction wide at turn seven and spun, the front of his RB4 making contact with the unforgiving walls. Therefore, with no time to recover and repair the car in between the sessions, Webber was left to watch his rivals fight out the final grid order in Q3 from the pits. 

As was the case in Monaco two weeks ago, bad weather has had its part to play in proceedings so far, Friday’s opening practice session was affected by rain which kept Webber in the garage for most of the 90 minutes. However, he did venture out for one timed run as track conditions improved, setting the seventh fastest time of 1min 18.712s behind the two Ferraris, two McLarens and two BMWs.

The track was dry for practice two and so everyone was keen to get as much running under their belts as possible, Webber completing five timed runs and ending up in seventh position with a best time of 1min 16.604s, again behind the usual suspects!

After a light early morning shower, Saturday turned into a hot and sticky day and it was these conditions which contributed to a number of incidents as the tarmac around the circuit broke up. Webber completed final practice without any problems although, like everyone, his final run was interrupted when Sebastian Vettel crashed his Toro Rosso heavily and brought out the red flags. The session was restarted with six minutes remaining and Webber popped in a 1min 17.062s on his first lap to go ninth fastest before yellow flags for Sebastian Bourdais in the sister Toro Rosso who brushed the fence a lap later prevented any further improvement in times.

Qualifying started off strongly for Webber, the Red Bull Racing driver setting a time of 1min 17.801s on his first run to go sixth quickest.  He had dropped to eighth by the time he came out for his second and final run but then improved to a 1min 17.582s - setting the fastest overall second sector time - to end the session seventh.  Q2 seemed to be going to plan too, Webber third fastest time at the start of the session with a 1min 17.819s before slipping to seventh prior to his final run. His first lap of 1min 17.523s saw him move into fourth for a brief moment but then dropping to fifth. Webber improved his first sector time on his second lap but then undetected by the cameras or the commentators, he failed to record a second sector time and it was only after the session ended that the cameras picked up the RB4 sitting at the side of the track.

“Everything went well in our normal qualifying preparation." explained Webber afterwards. "We had planned to use just one set of tyres for Q1 for one run which would have been enough. But the team was keen for me to do another run because track conditions were very unpredictable. In the end, I got through Q1 easily.  

“However, I wasn’t overly happy with my first lap in Q2 and told Ciaron (Pilbeam; Mark’s engineer) that I wanted to switch to the harder tyres for my second run. To my amazement, he told me I was P3 after my first lap. I started my first lap on the hard tyres and improved my time and then was pushing to improve again (which in hindsight it seemed I didn’t need to do) when I lost the car at turn seven on the marbles where the track was breaking up. It was very frustrating but all is not lost; it’s important that we try and get away well today and I’m predicting a very interesting Grand Prix with quite a few Safety Car periods.”