HRT had a good qualifying, Vitantonio outqualified both Virgin cars and Narain Karthikeyan was in front of d'Ambrosio. The gap to the Team Lotus cars is still almost 1.5 seconds but Liuzzi is happy with the improvement the team has made: "It will be an interesting Sunday. We showed today that we have made a step forward; we're ahead of our closest competitor so we've got an interesting race ahead."

In the first races of the season the team struggled to achieve times within 107% of the fastest time. Liuzzi says that isn't a problem anymore: "For me the 107% rule is not a problem anymore but, for sure, in this kind of circuit where KERS and DRS make a difference, we weren't that far off it but it's not something that should worry us for the future, we must just focus on beating our rivals." HRT introduced a couple of upgrades this race. One of those upgrades is an exhaust blown diffuser. "The new exhaust seems to be working well but we still have to get the best out of it," commented Liuzzi. "It takes a few races to optimize this, we have to understand the system a little more and make it work better for the future."

For the race the Italian doesn't know what to expect. He hopes some rain will spice the race up a little: "The race might be under rain so it could be different to what we expected beforehand but it will make it more exciting and we will have to push hard to get the best out of the car."

Last year Bruno Senna had a gearbox failure and Karun Chandhok finished the race 4 laps behind the winner.