Webber apologises for wrong call

Mark Webber was beaten by both McLarens and Fernando Alonso in qualifying © Getty Images

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Mark Webber apologised to Red Bull for making the wrong decision on his qualifying strategy ahead of the Italian Grand Prix.

Webber completed only one run in the final part of qualifying, eventually setting a time good enough for fifth on the grid. He told the BBC that he had to take the blame for not being completely sure of how he wanted to approach the session, but said his grid position would still allow him to challenge at the front because the car was fundamentally quick.

"We were a bit late out just trying to manage some KERS stuff which worked OK in the end until Q3 when we had a little bit of a hiccup," Webber said. "I think I made it a little bit difficult for the team today in terms of my run plan, I wasn't completely clear what I wanted to do so it wasn't the best Q3 at all. The tyres were definitely strong enough for the first lap, but I didn't choose the best run program so I apologise to the engineers.

"In the end, we're up there. We can still race from there, we've got a pretty good race car to be honest so we've clearly underperformed today and we'll come back tomorrow."

Expanding on his KERS problem, he said it had cost him some time but wasn't responsible for the gap to his pole-sitting team-mate Sebastian Vettel.

"It was intermittent on my last run; we should be OK for tomorrow hopefully, it's not the full deficit but obviously it cost us today."

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