28/02/2014
NEWS STORY
For the second successive day, Sergio Perez and Force India topped the timesheets in Bahrain, while Red Bull also made "significant progress".
The Mexican was quick from the outset, while reliability - having completed 213 laps in two days - also appears not to be an issue.
In ideal conditions the eleven drivers on duty completed 868 laps, over 100 more than yesterday, some of them at the wheel for the last time before Melbourne.
While Red Bull has made obvious progress, Daniel Ricciardo closing to within 0.173s of Perez' time, it is clear that the Renault powered tears are still hurting. His car, still suffering overheating issues, Ricciardo concentrated on short runs, especially in the morning, his pit crew always ready with a fire extinguisher to hand, whilst at Caterham Marcus Ericsson's day came to an early end when the Swede's car stopped on track (T4) following a small fire.
Like Ericsson, Pastor Maldonado also suffered a small fire, to his Lotus, this, together with a number of other issues, including software problems, restricting his running to just 31 laps. The other Renault runner, Jean-Eric Vergne at Toro Rosso, completed a promising 61 laps but was over 4s off the pace.
The Mercedes teams continue to impress though, for the second day, the works team lost track time. Following the unspecified problem that hampered Nico Rosberg yesterday, today Lewis Hamilton had his track time compromised by a gearbox issue which resulted in an early bath.
Ferrari continues to impress with Fernando Alonso completing an impressive 122 laps on his way to posting a best time just 0.064s shy of Perez while at Williams the Spaniard's former teammate, Felipe Massa, finished fourth quickest with a further 103 laps to the team's tally.
The Brazilian was one of several drivers to complete a race distance today, while Hamilton, Jenson Button, Maldonado and Ericsson were the cause of the four red flag periods.
"It feels very good to have another full day and to do so many laps," said Perez, who now hands over to teammate Nico Hulkenberg for the final two days of the test. "It's my last time in the car until we arrive in Melbourne and I'm feeling positive about how things are going. The set-up work today was very useful because we tried some different things to have a better direction for the first race. Everything went to plan and we managed to complete all the long runs in the afternoon."
"It has been another busy day with lots of miles completed and a great deal learned," added Technical Director, Andrew Green. "The programme this morning involved assessing a different set-up direction compared to yesterday, which will help in our decision-making going into Melbourne. After lunch we switched to extended runs using several of the tyres compounds available to us. It's been important for Sergio to have two solid days in the car to get him more comfortable with the VJM07 and race-ready for Melbourne."
This morning, Alonso continued with development work on the F14 T, trying various changes to the set-up and running a comparison of some aerodynamic parts. In the afternoon, he completed a race simulation with live pit-stops.
"Six hundred kilometres are always welcome," he said, "but it's still too early to say we are a hundred percent ready for Melbourne. We still have a lot to learn, but I am happy with the way the day went. In the morning, we did some set-up work which taught us what was the best direction to go in, while in the afternoon, we managed to complete a race simulation and every lap we did can be added to the learning phase, which is the normal situation to be in during winter testing.
"On the performance front, it's still difficult to have a clear idea of what our rivals are up to," he admitted, "and I think we will only find that out in Australia."
Ricciardo recorded 66 largely trouble-free laps, the team's highest mileage of the year, as his team conduct a number of background tests and aerodynamic evaluations as well as some pit stop practice.
"It went a lot better today," said the Australian. "This morning it was important to have the race crew here to do the pit stops, as they haven't had the chance to get to grips with the car yet, so we didn't do that many laps in the morning. However, in the afternoon we did some good stuff. We had a go on the soft tyre, which was nice, to see how the car responds with a bit more grip. We also did one long run at the end, which was very important, just to see how the car is behaving with the tyres. A big improvement everywhere over yesterday and a much more optimistic outlook now I think. We still have a lot to learn and understand, but we're making progress and the past two days have been a big step in the right direction."
"A very much better day's work for us today," added Race Engineering Co-ordinator, Andy Damerum. "We were a bit late out in the morning, but that was simply due to the repairs we had to make overnight because of the damage we had yesterday. That was pretty much a 'fix in the field'. When we did send Daniel out this morning we again put him on short runs just to test everything, as obviously you don't want to push too hard, have a problem and then wreck the rest of the day. That cautious approach also allowed us to do some pit stop practice, which we haven't done as yet and also to do some aero work on the car. That sort of thing is always going on in the background but I suppose today was the first time it has been visible. We were back in the garage over lunch to make some changes, though nothing drastic, and then in the afternoon we were very much better again. Daniel was able to do a longer run of 20 timed laps, our longest so far.
"The car is still difficult to drive for Daniel but we'll tune that out," he continued. We have more parts to fit overnight and hopefully we'll be able to get some more decent runs in with Sebastian over the next two days and also give him the opportunity to do some performance runs. Overall a good day today and very encouraging."
"I think it was another important day for us," said Felipe Massa who focussed on aero evaluation, a race simulation and set-up work. "We are starting to understand the car a lot more. It was really my first full day driving, after only getting half a day last week, so I'm still looking forward to understanding more tomorrow and doing everything we can do to be as prepared as possible for the first race. I am happy with how we are working as a team and tomorrow will be another important day."
"We ran a similar programme today as yesterday," revealed Rod Nelson, the team's Chief Test & Support Engineer. "Felipe started the morning doing some mechanical and aero tests, before going on to some longer runs in the afternoon. We then finished with some performance runs this evening looking at some new systems on the car. It was nice to have a relatively trouble-free day with Felipe as he hasn't had the best of winter testing up to now, so it's good to see him with a smile on his face. We are now looking forward to concentrating on pushing the car for more performance over the final two days."
At McLaren, Jenson Button's programme was affected by a gearbox issue - just as he was about to begin a late-morning race simulation run. The resultant repairs kept the car in the garage for much of the day. However, the mechanics were able to get him running for the final 75 minutes of the session, enabling him to get a long-run under his belt before the flag fell.
"We had a problem within the gearbox," said the English driver, "it took a while to change, as anything within the power-unit does these days, but we got back out at the end, and everything ran smoothly, which was good.
"It was a shame to lose that time," he admitted, "it's the first major issue we've had this winter; but it's better to suffer it here, rather than at a race weekend. We were still able to do a long-run on high-fuel this afternoon.
"The basic car is good, and there's a great deal of potential there, but there's still a lot of work to do. We have a good understanding of the power-unit, and we know how to race it, but, in terms of balance and grip, the car isn't quite there yet. We've got some good improvements in the pipeline - and they should help us close the gap to the front of the grid."
It was convincing day for Jules Bianchi and Marussia, the Frenchman completing 75 laps on his way to posting the sixth best time of the day. In the afternoon Bianchi was able to build on the morning's shorter runs towards longer race simulation runs. Thankfully the day ran relatively smoothly, which afforded the team the consistency required for data gathering and evaluation.
"I am really happy with what we have achieved today," beamed the Frenchman. "The car feels good and we have had the reliability to really build our mileage. We would have liked to have some more laps for sure, but we were able to enjoy some good runs and get a really good feeling for the car in high and low fuel conditions. I am looking forward to my second day of running tomorrow and I hope we can continue the good work of the last two days. I would like to thank the Team and our partners Scuderia Ferrari for all the hard work, which is now starting to show on the track."
"We are encouraged by a second positive day of testing here, which we conclude having achieved the sixth highest number of laps here today," said John Booth. "Once again we benefited from a reasonably smooth day of running and we were able to build the consistency we need to understand the car and get the maximum from it. It is still very early days for us; there is certainly a great deal more work to be done on set-up, which we will focus on rather more in the remaining two days. It feels like we are making good progress though and the hard work is starting to pay off."
At Mercedes, the programme targeted a race simulation programme in the morning, followed by setup work in the afternoon. Hamilton emerged for his first run at 9:04, completing 61 laps before the lunch break. A further 28 laps followed in the afternoon, before a gearbox problem curtailed running with 90 minutes remaining.
"Like every team, we're encountering problems every day and we've still got some work to do in terms of both reliability and speed," admitted Hamilton. "There are no specific problem areas, just lots of different things we need to improve. It's important to get as much mileage under our belts as we can and just as important to discover any problems before we get to Melbourne. It might be frustrating at times but finding them at this stage is actually a positive.
"We really don't know where anyone stands right now," he admitted, "and we have enough to concentrate on without looking at how other teams are getting on. The focus is on ourselves and will continue to be right up to the first race. Today was a fairly average day but I've got one more to go before we get to Melbourne, so hopefully that will be a bit more productive."
"Our morning programme targeted a baseline check run followed by a race distance simulation," confirmed Paddy Lowe. "The day started off without any problems, save a small spin for Lewis on cold tyres at the start of the first run, which briefly halted his progress but caused no major dramas. Once we got going again Lewis put together a good run, with encouraging readings in particular during the middle stint on the hard tyre, before a failure in the ERS system delayed running during the final stint. We returned to the track after lunch to conduct setup work. However, a problem with the gearbox unfortunately meant that our running was curtailed around 90 minutes early. Despite this, we have learned a number of valuable things from today's session and look forward to getting back down to work tomorrow."
Toro Rosso continued to make progress, even if the times reflect the fact the team was not chasing lap times. Work centred on evaluating various suspension settings and on getting the balance right with the new aero components first tried yesterday.
Also on the agenda was engine mapping work, which also gave positive results, as did tests aimed at evaluating brakes and cooling with the different aero package. Daniil Kvyat takes over tomorrow, for what will be his last day of testing, before he makes his official F1 race debut in Melbourne.
"We completed a good number of laps today without any major problems," said Vergne, "so it shows we are getting there. There is still a lot to do, but we can say we have made some steps forward and we must continue to do as much mileage as possible in the two days that are left. I will be back in the car on Sunday here, when I hope we will be in a position to do a qualifying and race simulation."
According to the Swiss outfit it was a good day of testing for Sauber, where the priorities were aero tests and practice of race weekend procedures. Esteban Gutierrez completed several short runs in the morning and race simulations in the afternoon. Overall he completed a total of 106 laps.
"The mileage we covered today was great," said the Mexican, "and these were the most laps in one day for the team so far. From a reliability point of view, I think we are doing well so far. After some aero work this morning I was able to get into the long runs and race simulation. I also managed to get a feeling for different settings, including fuel saving, and that worked quite well. The pit crew and the engineers are working incredibly hard, and together we were able to get used to race weekend procedures."
"Today was a good day," added Giampaolo Dall'Ara, the team's Head of Track Engineering. "We got through the programme smoothly. In the morning we were testing various aero maps and managed some race simulations in the afternoon. This means, in addition to the long runs yesterday, we are gaining more experience with the fuel management system. We covered a lot of race mileage and didn't allocate many new tyre sets to the runs. We were able to really get into race weekend procedures. With a new car it's always important to get the drivers and pit crew up to speed for the first race. This year it will be even more important to effectively manage all those routines, and we made progress in that regard today."
It was another difficult day for Lotus where Pastor Maldonado ended the day with just 31 laps completed after a localised fire in the rear of the E22 ended the day's running.
"It was a tough day for us with the fire," admitted the Venezuelan. "We need to keep working and for sure it's not an ideal situation for the team, or for me but we need to keep focus, work together and I hope for the future we can be better. Today was my last day of pre-season testing so it will be very interesting when we get to Australia."
"Today we had a localised fire in the car which ended our running early and caused a reasonable amount of damage to the E22," added Alan Permane. "We're inspecting the chassis and installation very carefully to deduce the cause of the fire and rectify any issues we find. Clearly this is not how we wanted to spend our day, but our focus is getting the most from the remaining days of the test."
There was a fire also for Caterham, the Anglo-Malaysian outfit subsequently tweeting: "Appropriately we're having barbecue for dinner..."
"My first day of the final test in the car and it obviously didn't end as we wanted it to," said Marcus Ericsson, "but we did achieve quite a lot of the plan we'd set for the day. We'd had a stop/start morning but the afternoon session was going well until a technical problem just after I exited the pits after the first stint of a race simulation started a fire which forced me to stop the car on track. We'd started after lunch with a few runs evaluating setup options and then went onto the full race simulation which was going to plan until just after the first pitstop when the problem started and I had to pull over. However, we had been able to run through a lot of the procedures we'd planned for today, including race starts and launches so I'm pleased we've ticked them off.
"The fire itself was out pretty quickly and the boys now have a lot of work ahead of them to find out what happened and get it all fixed for tomorrow. I'd like to have had some more laps today, but we still have another day left and with every lap I'm learning, so I'm still as positive as I was when we arrived here and just want to get back in the car and back to work."
"We made some more progress today but the day obviously did not end as anyone in the team would have wanted," admitted Cedrik Staudohar, Renault Sport F1's Track Support Leader. "From our side, we continue to understand more about the issues we have to deal with to unlock the full performance of the Power Unit, but reliability is also key and we will continue to focus on that for the last two days of the final test, and back at Viry where everybody is focused on finding solutions to give the team the best chance of success when the season starts in Australia."
The team subsequently announced that the Swede will drive again tomorrow with Kamui Kobayashi back in the car on Sunday, the final day of testing.
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Chris Balfe