Whitley: We were confident that we would make it through to the second session.

      The Sauber drivers in the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix will start from 18th and 19th positions, and the Swiss team admits that qualifying was not good. Nico Hulkenberg made the mistake of locking the front wheels on braking before the first corner, and Gabriel Bortoleto was unlucky.

      First, his C45 got caught in some kind of plastic bag, which forced him to return to the pits, and in a crucial attempt, he spun around in the same 1st corner when he tried to use the slipstream behind the car in front.

      Jonathan Wheatley, team principal: "We are somewhat disappointed with the results of this qualification, as we were confident that we would be able to qualify for the second session.

      Both drivers had problems in turn 1. Nico failed to achieve the braking performance he had hoped for, and ended up off the track at turn 2. And Gabriel picked up a lot of speed when he used the slipstream behind another car, but in the end he turned around.

      In addition, due to technical problems with his C45, he did not complete enough laps in yesterday's practice to properly adapt to such a difficult track.

      But we will rebuild, draw conclusions from what happened today, and try to prepare for tomorrow's race..."

      Nico Hulkenberg (18th): "We were hoping that qualifying would be different. But in a crucial attempt in the first session, I locked the front wheel in turn 1 and ended up off the track.

      I still believe that we had the potential to make it through to the second session. But the gaps are so small now that everything has to be perfect for this every time.

      We need to analyze exactly what happened, because I have a feeling that the locking of the brakes was somewhat unusual. I even braked a little earlier because I felt that the front tires were not warmed up enough compared to the previous attempt.

      Even so, the slowdown was not as intense as I had hoped. Of course, 18th position is not an ideal place to start, but we accept this challenge and tomorrow we will do our best to win back. However, in order to make our way forward, we need to have some events ahead of us on the track, and at the same time we must apply the right tactics."

       Gabriel Bortoleto (20th): "First of all, I want to thank the team for their hard work, because they had to replace the chassis for me and prepare the car on time for today.

      My first attempt was more or less good, but on the second one the car got caught in some kind of plastic bag, which caused me to return to the pits for the mechanics to remove it. And on the third attempt, I was overly optimistic when I tried to take advantage of the slipstream behind Max Verstappen's Red Bull, and I missed the braking point, and as a result, the car spun around.

      We always try to attack at the limit, we do everything possible to get into the second session, but I made a mistake, so I didn't work out the best today. Definitely, skipping yesterday's second training session didn't help matters either.

      It's going to be a difficult race tomorrow, but we'll give it our all and try to get as much information as possible about the behavior of the car."