• Japanese Grand Prix - Qualifying

Rosberg annoyed with sixth on the grid

Nico Rosberg: "It's a bit annoying when you see it's so close" © Getty Images

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Nico Rosberg has set his car up with a focus on race pace but said his grid position of sixth for the Japanese Grand Prix is "annoying".

With team-mate Lewis Hamilton third, Rosberg was outqualified by just 0.144s but starts three places further back. Even though he hopes the strategy will pay dividends in the race Rosberg said the close nature of qualifying meant he's frustrated not to be starting from a higher position.

"I'm definitely focused on the race but I would have liked to have been one or two positions further up, I didn't expect to be sixth," Rosberg said. "It's a bit annoying when you see it's so close, it was a decent lap and everything so it's OK in the end. I'm still confident I can move up tomorrow and have a very good race, because it's going to be tough tomorrow; with the rear tyre degradation for sure it's going to be quite a challenge."

With the wind direction having changed and the speeds higher than Friday, Rosberg said FP3 was a case of starting from scratch with car set-up.

"It was a completely different world out there today; incredible. You can't believe how a wind change transforms everything. The first couple of corners: unbelievable. Just the 20kph more, the difference you get from the front, unreal really, it's very difficult to describe. That's why starting today was a whole new game. You had to set up the car completely differently again and everything was starting from scratch."

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