Jenson Button says he "enjoyed" what could be his last ever Formula 1 qualifying session, despite missing out on a spot in the final top-ten shoot-out alongside team-mate Fernando Alonso.
The Briton, who is likely competing in his last F1 race this weekend, will line-up P12 on Sunday's Abu Dhabi Grand Prix grid, and although his team-mate managed to get through to Q3, Button believes his position, which allows him to start on fresh tyres, sets him up for a good race.
"It was good fun out there this evening. I enjoyed it," commented Button.
"As the track cooled down, we needed to balance the car up with more front-end grip, but didn’t have anything left in the car, so the resulting understeer cost me a little bit of time.
"To be fair, however, 12th position isn’t a bad place to be for tomorrow: we get to run new tyres. With these tyre regulations, it’s often better to start outside the top 10 in order to best free up the strategy for the race.
"I’d definitely rather have a good race tomorrow than a good qualifying today."
Button is eyeing a points finish in his final race: "None of the compounds last for long around here, so it’ll be interesting to see what happens tomorrow – points are definitely possible."
Alonso too believes a points finish is on the cards for McLaren, with the Spaniard starting tenth.
"I think we have to be happy today: it was definitely a good quali for us," he added.
"There are no big threats from behind us in terms of the championship, and it’ll be hard tomorrow to finish higher than the position we’re already in, so let’s just enjoy this final race and hopefully finish on a high by scoring some good points."
Discussion about this post