Nico and Michael will start the Spanish Grand Prix from ninth and seventh positions respectively following today's qualifying hour at the Circuit de Catalunya.

Today's qualifying was dominated by a strategic use of tyre sets with a view to tomorrow's race. " We completed useful race preparation work this morning, showed some improvement and went into qualifying expecting an interesting session due to the desire to save tyres for the race," explained Bob Bell. "The story of qualifying indeed turned out to be one of managing tyre use, and it certainly delivered a unique session."

Just three teams got both their cars into the top ten shoot-out this afternoon, including MERCEDES AMG PETRONAS. "From a team perspective, we got two cars into the top ten and both drivers will start from the cleaner side of the grid, while our positions were probably as good as we could have achieved with the way we chose to use the tyres," said Bell. "Tomorrow's forecast is still for cooler temperatures, and with what we have seen both this weekend and this season so far, we know that a difference of several degrees in track temperature can make a huge difference to how different cars perform. We can expect a very interesting race."

Vice-President Mercedes-Benz Motorsport Norbert Haug expects an exciting race: "It is most likely that we will see changes in the top ten order from today at the end of the race tomorrow. Our target will be to score points with both cars posting consistent lap times, as Nico did during his long run at the end of the final practice session this morning."