Renault Sport Formula One Team driver Jolyon Palmer will start tomorrow’s (15 May) Spanish Grand Prix from 17^th on the grid.

The young Briton had completed fewer laps than any of the 21 other drivers going into qualifying, after sitting out Free Practice 1 on Friday and suffering with a puncture in the second session at the Circuit de Catalunya. 

Jolyon made steady progress during the third practice segment earlier this morning and remained confident ahead of qualifying, admitting that it would be tight in his quest to make Q2.

He fired in a decent effort on his maiden run, but found himself on the cusp of the order in 17^th. The 25-year-old then produced his best lap time of 1:24.903s in the closing moments and looked to have hauled himself into the second session. 

The McLaren of Jenson Button was still on track, however, and the former Formula 1 World Champion went quicker than his young British counterpart as the chequered flag fell, pushing Jolyon back down to 17^th and out of the next qualifying segment.

Jolyon encouragingly ended up ahead of both Manor and Sauber cars, and also the Williams of Felipe Massa, which leaves him in a position where he has moved forward from before. He was one place lower on the starting grid in Russia last time out, and fought his way through to tenth after the first lap melee, so he’s confident he can again progress during tomorrow’s encounter in Barcelona.

"I am happy with the car and the pace was pretty reasonable to be honest," said Jolyon. "It’s just those one or two tenths that we needed to find, which is frustrating after missing out on a lot of running yesterday. Unfortunately being on the cusp of Q1/Q2 is where we are as a team in terms of performance and it’s so tight on the timesheets around those positions. We’ve not been able to complete as many laps over the weekend as we’d have hoped, but Barcelona is a circuit we know well and the car is feeling pretty good – I am confident that we can race from there tomorrow."