F1: Williams says problem Monaco specific

The Williams Formula 1 team is "reasonably confident" its poor Monaco Grand Prix performance so far will not be repeated at other tracks this season.

Valtteri Bottas was failed to make Q2 for the first time since last year's British GP after finishing qualifying 16th fastest while teammate Felipe Massa could only manage 14th.

This year, Williams has excelled on tracks with long straights and high-speed corners – two aspects not applicable to Monte Carlo's tight and twisty street circuit.

"The situation for us is exaggerated from the point of view that you've got very low-surface roughness here, no high-speed corners, no straights within which you could generate indentation when you've got a lot of load on the car," said performance chief Rob Smedley. "So it's a bit of a vicious circle and to get yourselves out of it, you've got to do so with the tools you've got available at the track, which is very difficult.

"In the past we've needed to get on top of the tire management at the track and we haven't explored them well enough. But I'm quite happy on this occasion that we have done a reasonable amount of due diligence and there's nothing glaring there. In fact in terms of what you can actually do here to generate grip, we've done a reasonable amount."

When asked if he was confident this was a one-off, Smedley said: "It's very circuit characteristic, very specific to this circuit. Although I'm not 100 percent confident, I am reasonably confident."

Bottas admitted that Williams knew this weekend would be tough for the team, as it was last year when both cars went out in Q2. He is hopeful the team's form will pick up at the next race in Canada and beyond.

"We knew this wouldn't be the best track for us but we didn't expect it to be this difficult," he said. "We tried plenty of things with the tires this weekend and still we are struggling. But we will be back to normal kinds of tracks soon so I'm not worried about the rest of the season.

"We didn't bring any updates here but we know we will have updates for the next two races. Hopefully this is a one-off and tomorrow it's just important for us to minimize the damage. Any points we can get tomorrow is good."

Massa echoed Bottas's comments, adding: "There are so many things on this track which work against us so I expected it to be the worst track for us."

Originally on Autosport.com