Sochi: Putting up a terrific show, both Sahara Force India drivers managed top-10 places on the grid for Sunday's Russian Grand Prix as Nico Hulkenberg qualfied sixth, just ahead of teammate Sergio Perez, here.
Both the drivers sounded confident but had a common worry about the tyre performance during the race.
"Even though we ve had limited running here in practice, I ve had a good feeling with the car there is a nice balance and it s giving me confidence. The result today is probably the maximum we could achieve when you look at the cars ahead of us and it means we re starting in a great position for tomorrow. The race is going to be interesting because there are still some unknowns about how the tyres will behave over long runs and the strategy calls won t be easy," the German racer said.
Sergio Perez said it is not an easy track to put a good lap together and getting the tyres to the right temperature is a challenge.
"I set my best lap on used tyres, which shows that the supersoft tyres take a long time to reach their best. There are still a few question marks about the performance of the tyres during long runs, which will make it very interesting tomorrow, but I don't expect degradation to be very high.
"We have a very good chance to be competitive in the race. It will be a tough one but I m confident we can come away from it with some big points."
Force India are placed fifth in the contructors championhsip with 77 points, 17 more than closest team, Lotus.
