Why? Quite simply because, in qualifying trim on low fuel, the car did not have the speed to produce a quick first flying lap, despite the best efforts of Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso. The Brazilian had the better day, at least getting through into Q3, the final shoot-out for the top ten places on the grid, setting the eighth fastest time. Fernando went out at the end of Q2, two places off making it to the final session, at a moment when many cars were lapping in almost identical times.

At the start of the weekend, all the talk was of Red Bull again being the dominant force and so it turned out to be this afternoon, when Barcelona and Monaco winner, Mark Webber took pole position. However, McLaren has also looked in good shape in Istanbul and joining the Australian on the front row will be Lewis Hamilton. Their respective team-mates line up behind them, with Sebastian Vettel third and Jenson Button fourth. Row 3 is an all Mercedes affair, with Michael Schumacher fifth ahead of Nico Rosberg. Felipe has the Renault of Robert Kubica on his inside, while Fernando shares his row with Adrian Sutil in the Force India.

Aiming for the podium might be a bit over ambitious for the Prancing Horse duo, but race fans should at the very least enjoy the spectacle of Felipe and Fernando trying to fight their way up the order, given that the results of Friday’s free practice session show that the Ferraris are definitely more competitive over a long run. The 58 lap race gets underway at 15h00 local time tomorrow.

“These are certainly not the positions from which we would have liked to start the eight hundredth Grand Prix in the history of the Scuderia, but we have to be honest and admit that today, our performance did not live up to our expectations. We have to react immediately, starting from tomorrow’s race, when we will try to bring home as many points as possible. Then we must accelerate the development of our car to be competitive at every type of circuit. Today, Felipe did the maximum, using all the potential available from his car and the tyres. Fernando did not have a perfect Q2 and missed the cut for the final part of qualifying: when the gaps are so close, it takes very little to be in or out.”

Felipe Massa: “We were slower than our main rivals, so we will have to work very hard to get back to fighting for the top places and there can be no doubt about that. Even if this is a track I like very much, today I could not do any better than eighth place. The team and I cannot be pleased about it, but we have to react calmly and analyse the reasons that have led to this situation. Now we will concentrate on tomorrow’s race: it will be tough but we will try and do our very best.”

Fernando Alonso: “Nothing strange happened: twelfth place is what we deserve from what we have seen today. I did not have enough speed and, when there are nine drivers within half a second, as happened today in Q2, it takes an instant to be either fourth or twelfth and in my case it was the latter. I don’t think I could have done better today: I did practically the same time three times. Tomorrow will be tough and we will be racing defensively, but we will try and get the best result possible. I don’t think today’s weather, with slightly lower temperatures, had an influence on this result. Already in Q1, we realised we were not competitive at the highest level and that it would be difficult to get into Q3. The car balance is okay, as it was yesterday when we were quicker.”

Chris Dyer: “It was a very frustrating qualifying for us: we definitely expected a better result than this. The F10 was not quick enough to be competitive in qualifying, while, at least from what we could see yesterday, over a distance, the situation seems to be better. Tomorrow, we face an uphill race, but we must not take anything for granted and try to bring both cars home in the points. Unfortunately, both drivers will start from the dirty side of the track, which is a definite disadvantage. Felipe did a great job, managing to get into Q3 and getting every last possible fraction of performance out of the car. Fernando was right on the cut after his first run in Q2 and at the start of his second, he did not get a perfect lap and then on the next lap, the tyres were no longer at their best.”