10/02/2012
NEWS STORY
Despite topping the timesheets on the final day of the testing at Jerez, Fernando Alonso insists that times at this stage are unimportant and that the true order will only be obvious in Melbourne.
As the Maranello outfit describes its times this week as "schizophrenic" - way down the timesheets for the first three days, about two or three seconds off the pace, and then quickest on the final day, almost a second ahead of the rest - the Spaniard says that despite appearances nothing has changed.
"This time is worth nothing as is the one I set yesterday and those of the previous days," Alonso told reporters at the end of today's action. "Yesterday, we worked mainly with the hard tyres and the others ran the softs and we were seventh. Today, we fitted the softs and maybe the others did not and we are first. That's all it is.
"We got on with our job," he continued, "even if today and yesterday we had some reliability problems we could have done without which prevented us from doing everything we would have wanted. For me, it was good to be back in the car after two and a half months and feel once again all the emotions that come with driving a Formula 1 car. I think that, from the start of the test up to today, we have improved a great deal, it's like night and day, but there is still much to do, especially on the aerodynamics and on reliability. Then, we will see if it is really a sign of great strength to have immediately done so many kilometres: last year, on the first day we did a lot of laps and then we know how things turned out, so maybe there was too big a margin..."
The Spaniard, like his teammate, believes there is room for improvement with the F2012. "Everything about this car is new, with very few parts carried over from last year's and there are many innovations, which have come out of a different philosophy to the one adopted in the past. For example, the power steering: it's new and we worked a lot these past days on sorting it out and today we began to see the benefits for the first time. As I said earlier, there is much to do, but that doesn't scare us.
"These past few days we have done a great deal of laps, just to gather data, without being able to do much work in any depth on the set-up, therefore I think that, when we will be able to do that, we will also improve the performance. Already, here at Jerez, the moment we did make some changes, we got the response we were expecting, even if it's true that the fact the car is more complex from a mechanical and aerodynamic point of view definitely makes the tasks more complex. Today we saw a good example of that: we have only done around forty laps partly because it took so much time to carry out the changes we needed to make on the car to complete our programme. I think that in Barcelona, when we will be back on track, the situation will be different and we will be much better prepared compared to this test, where above all we had to learn how to get to grips with this car. Even we the drivers have more to do, because with so many new things on the car it's even more vital we give the right feedback to the engineers."
Asked, even at this early stage, to make a prediction about the championship, the Spaniard replied: "We will see, as there are still several weeks to go to Melbourne. Here, day after day, we have progressed, getting ever more confident in the car: we must continue in this direction and improve, but it is much too early to draw any conclusions."
And Lotus? "I don't know," he admitted, "as even for them it's a bit early and I would rather just say I am very happy to see Kimi back: he's a great driver and a great person."