The Team McLaren Mercedes 2006 Formula One car, the MP4-21, made its track debut today at the Circuit de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain. The MP4-21 is fundamentally a new car, however the basic concept is an evolution of the 2005 challenger, the MP4-20, which won ten out of the season's 19 Grands Prix.

Test driver, Pedro de la Rosa, was at the wheel of the MP4-21 as it left the garage for the first time at 09:15 local time to complete its installation lap. Juan Pablo Montoya will take over driving duties for tomorrow, Tuesday 24th, and Wednesday 25th, with Kimi Raikkonen having his debut runs on Thursday 26th and Friday 27th January. Pedro and fellow test driver Gary Paffett will test alongside the team's race drivers in an interim MP4-20, continuing the Michelin tyre development programme, until chassis two of the new car is scheduled to hit the test track in Valencia sometime during the week commencing 13th February.

"I am really pleased to have been at the wheel of MP4-21 today" said Pedro. "The car feels good initially, but it is of course too early to really understand it's potential and we need to put a lot more laps on it. We have around 20 days of on track running before the cars leave for Bahrain on Friday 3rd March. As today is the initial shakedown, our focus will be to familiarise ourselves with the MP4-21 and the Mercedes-Benz FO 108S V8 engine, and to run the various systems checks that are required with a new car."

"Everyone at Team McLaren Mercedes is looking forward to the challenges ahead this season, and we took a major step in our preparations for 2006 today by starting to test the MP4-21 at Barcelona," commented Martin Whitmarsh, CEO Formula One, Team McLaren Mercedes. "The anticipation within the team as to how competitive the new car will be is great, particularly given the pace of our 2005 racer and the level of work that has been put into the MP4-21 project. However these are early days, we have a comprehensive programme to complete with the car over the next few weeks. This will mean hard and dedicated work from the whole team supported by our Technology Partners and Official Suppliers, including an aggressive schedule of upgrades to come on line before Bahrain."

The revised engine regulations for 2006, with the change from V10 to V8, has dominated the overall design process. Research into a direction for the MP4-21 began in August 2004, when Team McLaren Mercedes started to consider the new V8, 2.4 litre power plant, which as in 2005 has to last for two Grands Prix weekend. Designed and built from scratch, the Mercedes-Benz FO 108S V8, which ran for the first time at Silverstone on 13th September 2005 following its dyno debut on 15th June of the same year, also has to conform to the below restrictions:

V-angle of the cylinders set a 90 degrees

Use of a maximum of two inlet and exhaust valves each, previously restrictions have only covered the number of cylinders and a limit of five valves

Minimum engine weight of 95 kilograms

Maximum cylinder bore of 98 millimetres

The position of the engine's centre of gravity

Precisely defined alloys for the manufacturing of engine components