03/05/2012
NEWS STORY
Romain Grosjean topped the timesheets again on the final day of testing at Mugello, the Frenchman out-pacing Sebastian Vettel and Fernando Alonso as the teams prepared for Barcelona and beyond.
Having shared the top spot with Kamui Kobayashi yesterday, today's the French youngster's programme again included aerodynamic work, setups, suspension configuration & evaluation, high and medium fuel runs, data collection and correlation.
"After looking at the data from yesterday, we ran further back-to-back tests on our suspension configurations," said Trackside Operations Director, Alan Permane. "Track conditions were better today as a result of yesterday's running. We stopped early for lunch so that we could change the suspension and be out running straight away in the afternoon session. In the afternoon we also assessed some new floor updates applicable for Barcelona, as well as a rear suspension update fitted late in the day.
"After the rain on the first day, it's been a valuable two dry days of testing. Mugello is quite hard on the tyres; not in terms of degradation, but through the high speed loadings generating heat. This has taught us some interesting lessons applicable to the rest of the season. Mugello is also an excellent circuit for doing aerodynamic evaluation, so it has been time well spent here."
"It was another nice day today so I have been lucky with the weather here," said Grosjean. "We continued to work on the car and have gained more valuable data. We made a big change to the car at lunchtime and everything went according to plan. Mugello puts high demands on the driver so it's been a very good experience for me - and quite a workout! We were conducting a specific programme of evaluating components, so to be quick relative to our opposition even when we were not looking specifically to try to top the times is satisfying. I'm happy at the progress we've made here in Italy and looking forward to seeing how well this translates into lap time when we get to Barcelona."
Like yesterday, Red Bull focused largely on aerodynamic testing. Having amassed a vast amount of data over the past three days, the team will now return to its Milton Keynes base where analysis can take place in the run-up to next week's Spanish Grand Prix.
"It's been a useful couple of days and I've enjoyed the track a lot," said Vettel. "As usual we now have a lot of data to get through and that will take some time. We tried a few things and the results look encouraging; it's always difficult to tell whether we improved and by how much, but we got some good laps and some good information."
For Ferrari today's programme centred on experimenting with the new aerodynamic components introduced for the F2012, as well as a study of the behaviour of the Pirelli tyres. However, an off mid-morning caused damage to the front wing and the left front corner, which took two and a half hours to repair.
Daniel Ricciardo was back on duty for Toro Rosso the Australian's running on Wednesday having been limited as the Faenza outfit allowed teammate Jean-Eric Vergne to complete his full programme. The day was spent evaluating new components, and general development of the car.
"A good day with a high mileage," said the Australian, "getting through all our programme, which is always your first target at a test. With new parts you always hope they will deliver a big improvement, but the reality is that we must now look at the data to see where we really are. Certainly, from the cockpit I was happy with the feeling I had from the car and I really enjoyed driving this beautiful circuit again."
"Another full day with plenty of running and over a hundred laps completed in ideal conditions," added Chief Engineer, Laurent Mekies. "Overall this has been a very productive test for us and we managed to make up for the time lost through bad weather on Tuesday, so we have effectively had two and a half days of testing, during which we got through plenty of work, testing several new components, with both drivers completing a high mileage.
"The team worked hard here in Mugello," he continued, "but now that work must continue in the factory, as it is up to us to choose the best configuration and set-up specifications for the upcoming races and the right path to follow in terms of car development. That will involve carrying out a careful study of all the useful data we have gathered here."
It was another productive day for Sauber with Sergio Perez taking over from yesterday's joint pace-setter Kamui Kobayashi. Once again, the focus was on evaluating new aero parts for the C31 and testing the package for the forthcoming Spanish Grand Prix.
After the usual installation laps in the morning, Perez started his programme with some base line running and basic set-up work. Once this was done he continued with aero measurements. While struggling with the car's balance he also went off twice before the lunch break, but without any major damage to the car.
In the afternoon the team continued with testing and evaluating the new aero parts by doing long runs with Sergio remaining on high fuel loads.
Force India had Paul di Resta and Nico Hulkenberg on duty, the Scot being given an extra morning in lieu of yesterday's lack of running.
"After a tricky start to the week I'm pleased that we have ended the test with a full day of running," said Chief Engineer, Jakob Andreasen. "The focus this morning was on aero work and we fitted several devices to the car, which allowed us to collect the most important data to continue our assessment of the latest car developments. Later in the day we moved towards set-up work, running new sets of the medium and hard tyres and extracting performance from the car. Before we leave Mugello I would like to thank everyone in the team for their efforts over the last few days to ensure we were able to complete the main items on our job list. It puts us in a good position as we head to Barcelona for next week's Spanish Grand Prix."
"It was a much better day and good to get a reasonable number of laps in the car in dry conditions," said di Resta. "We had a busy programme focussing on aero data collection this morning, aero balance and general performance work. The data we have seems encouraging and I think that we are well prepared for Barcelona."
"I think we have learned quite a lot today," added Hulkenberg, "it's a good way to end the test with a busy afternoon. There was a lot to get through, but the main priority was on understanding the car we have here and making sure we feel ready for Barcelona. There's a lot of data to go through before we get there and we also have to look at how the different tyre compounds behaved, but overall I'm pleased with the day's work."
Having spent almost all the morning in the pits with an electrical issue, Pastor Maldonado finally took to the track this afternoon, the Venezuelan completing 63 laps on his way to posting the seventh best time of the day.
"We had a disappointing start to this morning's session with an electrical problem that necessitated stripping the car, thus incurring a large loss in track time," said Mark Gillan. "The mechanics worked hard to get the car back out on track in the early afternoon. We modified the run plan accordingly and successfully completed a number of aerodynamic and systems tests."
"We lost some time this morning but we had a good afternoon," added Maldonado. "The track is amazing so it was good to get a few runs completed this afternoon. We gathered a lot of data and I feel positive heading into the next race."
Nico Rosberg wrapped things up for Mercedes as the Brackley outfit spent the day concentrating on further tyre and set-up evaluations with the W03.
"It has been a good testing programme for us here in Mugello," said Rosberg, "and I have been able to complete a lot of mileage around this amazing track. Today, we learned a lot about tyre management, and this should help us at the next race in Barcelona. There is still a lot of work to do of course, and we do need to improve our car in fast corners, but overall I am pleased with the progress that we have made here this week."
"We have had a good week in Mugello," added Ross Brawn, "and have been able to complete much of our planned test programme despite the loss of some track time on Tuesday due to the poor weather conditions. The first opportunity for in-season testing for some time has proved beneficial, particularly as it has enabled us to test some new development ideas and take a closer look at improving the car from things that we have identified over the first four races. Mugello is a great track and I know that both Nico and Michael have enjoyed the experience of driving there this week."
Oliver Turvey continued for McLaren as the Woking outfit spent the day running through detailed evaluative work with front wing and exhaust iterations - including some rake tests for improved data gathering.
The team says it is "very pleased with Oliver's work today" having collected a large array of data, which will be filtered back into the design team in order to make a number of longer-term improvements to the car.
Further long the pitlane, Caterham continued its heavy programme running a number of updates for Heikki Kovalainen to try out.
"I enjoyed myself out there today," said the Finn, "even though a lot of what we were doing was pretty repetitive, it's still a good place to drive an F1 car around and having got through everything we'd planned it's good to leave this test on a positive note.
"We tried a variety of new parts and it felt like we may have found a couple of things that we can take to the next race. You can never tell just how much of an improvement something has been until you go through all the data, but the fact we've brought new parts that feel like a step forward is good. It shows we're pushing as hard as we can and that's what we need to do to achieve the goals this year."
"It's been another solid day for us," added Chief Engineer, Jody Egginton. "Heikki took over the car today and ran a program very similar to Vitaly's from day two, completing 139 laps which helped us achieve everything we wanted from this test. We have tried a number of new parts including bodywork, floor, exhausts and some work on the brakes, some of which we expect to see on the race cars next week in Barcelona.
"This has been a pretty hard week for everyone on track. We've run on all three days without any major mechanical issues, and we've put the hours in to help us keep progressing, so I want to thank everyone for a very good week of hard work. Now we need to take what we've achieved here into the start of the European season and make sure we keep up this level of reliability and focus at the races to come."
The weather and reliability of the MR01 conspired to ensure that today was a day of two halves for Marussia as Timo Glock attacked his testing programme with gusto.
The German completed 110 laps as he worked his way through a wide-ranging programme exploring the various tyre compounds, some engine calibration work, as well as an evaluation of the team's new aerodynamic upgrades for the start of the European season.
After losing a less than desirable amount of track time over the past two afternoons, the team needed a clear run at the final day's somewhat intensive programme. Bar a couple of red flags early on in the day, they got just that and leave Tuscany this evening happy with their achievements and with a mountain of data to feed back into the programme.
"A pretty good day I have to say," said Glock. "We got a lot of laps - 110 - and worked our way through many different things with the car. We were able to do a lot of comparisons and a lot of set-up work also, so in the end, I think it was a good last day and we have some important data to look through for Barcelona. Now we focus on the implementation for the Spanish Grand Prix and with some new components see what we can do there to continue the progress."
"It has been a challenging week for the team," added John Booth, "as we have been working to a not insubstantial programme of tyre evaluation, set-up work and the proving of our new aerodynamic package for the start of the European season.
"At the same time as working through these items we have been making directional calls in each area, based on our findings, and effecting production back at base to ensure we have the parts ready for next weekend's race, all in pretty rapid succession. So it has been a real 'team' effort and I'd like to congratulate everyone on a job very well done. It's fair to say we feel we have made good progress this week with our package, but we are quite certain that our competitors will have been busy too! For that reason I'm not going to make any predictions beyond saying that if closing the gap was our target, this week's results would suggest that we have made another positive step forward."
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