19/02/2019
NEWS STORY
Mercedes
On the second day of testing, Mercedes continued their aero and set-up programme while also running a number of systems checks on the W10. Lewis and Valtteri clocked 163 laps, accumulating miles as the new car continues to work reliably.
Lewis drove the car in the morning session, focusing on aero work, while Valtteri was behind the wheel in the afternoon, working on the set-up programme.
Mercedes-Benz Power Units completed a total of 1127 km today.
Valtteri will drive the W10 tomorrow morning, before Lewis takes over for the afternoon.
Lewis Hamilton: It's been a good day overall. It was quite cold in the morning, so switching the tyres on was a little bit tricky, but it seemed like a few people had similar issues. We were focusing on working through our run plan and we got through everything we wanted. It's good that we're getting in a lot of mileage and we will try to increase that over the next days as we continue to discover the characteristics of this car. That's the exciting part about it - learning something new and being faced with different challenges. Everyone is working so diligently, I'm really happy to be here with everyone for the seventh year in a row and I'm excited for this journey that we're embarking on.
Valtteri Bottas: We did a lot of laps today and again managed to complete our run plan. We're learning a lot about the W10 with each run and we're building a better understanding of the set-up. The car was better balanced than yesterday, but there's still a bit of room for improvement. As you can tell from the lap times, we've been focusing on long-run work. I'll be in the car tomorrow morning, so it will be a busy evening for me, taking in all the learnings from today. It's been a pretty normal test so far; fortunately, the car has been very reliable, so that's good news.
James Allison: We're just two days in, but already a quarter of the way through the precious days of winter testing. Today was another very useful day for us, accumulating a lot of miles, proving out a lot of components and testing with both drivers several set-up avenues. The car was trouble-free all day and we added to the knowledge about the tyres and the car that we started to acquire yesterday. This permits us to build a a foundation for the second test where all the interesting running will take place.
Ferrari
The second day of the first pre-season test saw Charles Leclerc make his official debut at the wheel of the SF90, following on from the two laps he completed during the filming day on Sunday.
The youngster completed a total of 157 laps; 73 in the morning, a further 84 in the afternoon. The Monegasque got in the car at 9 on the dot but the session was immediately red-flagged and he had to wait almost half an hour before going out on track.
Leclerc soon got to grips with the SF90, producing consistent lap times, which was useful for the engineers as they evaluated different parameters on the car in race trim. His best time of 1:18.247 was set just before the lunch break.
"I am very happy with the way today went," were the Monegasque driver's first comments as he got out of the car at the end of the day. "Despite some red flag interruptions, we were able to get through all our programme and to do 157 laps, which has produced a lot of useful data. In terms of feeling, I quickly felt comfortable with the SF90 and I have to say I really enjoyed myself.
"Emotion? There's always going to be some when you get into a Ferrari, but today I put that to one side because I had a job to do for the team. Let's hope we keep going like this over the next few days, because it's important to make the most of the few on-track testing opportunities we have."
Sebastian Vettel will be once again behind the wheel of the SF90 tomorrow, before handing back to Leclerc for the final day.
Red Bull
Day two saw Pierre Gasly get his first taste of the RB15. The Team's new recruit logged a solid 92 laps of the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya before a late afternoon spin cut short the Team's running for the day.
Pierre Gasly: "The day was positive and I was really happy to be back behind the wheel after the winter break. The first feeling is good. It was important for me to get comfortable in the car and we managed to do more than 90 laps. This afternoon, I was pushing and out of Turn 10 I went on the power, upshifted to fifth and lost the rear of the car. It was quite annoying to lose the last hour of testing. Apart from that, we tested a lot of things and got a lot of good information, there is a good potential. Of course we still have a lot of work to do over the next six days of testing but for me, aside from the last bit, the first day was great."
Head of Race Engineering, Guillaume Rocquelin: "It happens. Prior to Pierre's spin we had been doing a lot of short runs to gather data and there is quite a reset after that. Pierre was then on a quick lap and as you'd expect he was finding the limit. He's understandably not happy but it's not a disaster. We have a bit of work on this evening but we'll be ready for tomorrow. Aside from that, Pierre had a good first day in the car. The target this morning was to get more miles on the car, to give him a good feel for it and to cycle through tyres. There were some background tests happening but it was mainly about Pierre getting comfortable. In the afternoon, we switched to data gathering over short runs and that was the focus up until late afternoon and the spin."
Haas
Kevin Magnussen took over the VF-19 after teammate Romain Grosjean recorded 65 laps around the 16-turn track on Monday.
Cooler track conditions were prevalent for Magnussen's early running, the Dane first venturing out on-track shortly after 10 a.m. By the lunch break three hours later he had 33 laps banked, including the second-fastest time of the morning, a 1:19.234 set on the C3 Pirelli tire compound.
The afternoon saw Magnussen drop his best lap time to a 1:19.206, also on a fresh set of C3 rubber, good for third fastest on Tuesday from 12 participating drivers. A seat-fit issue curtailed his run program earlier than expected, Magnussen exiting proceedings with 59 laps set on his maiden VF-19 outing.
With 30-minutes remaining in the day, test driver Pietro Fittipaldi assumed driving responsibilities, the Brazilian enjoying two timed stints for 13 laps prior to the checkered flag.
Fittipaldi will remain behind the wheel of the VF-19 on Wednesday morning, with Grosjean testing in the afternoon – the team opting to swap the driver order from its original plan. Fittipaldi and Magnussen will then complete the first week of testing on Thursday.
Kevin Magnussen: "First impressions of the VF-19 were very good. The car seems to be handling well, it was showing consistency. I certainly have a good feeling to start off with. Of course, there's a lot more work to be done when it comes to the details, but there's no worries at this point."
Guenther Steiner: "It was a little bit of a mixed day today. Again, in the morning we struggled to get going, we had a few small issues on the car. It got better in the afternoon. Unfortunately, Kevin (Magnussen) didn't like his seat, so we put Pietro (Fittipaldi) in for the end of the day so he's ready for tomorrow morning. The day didn't start as we wanted it, but in the end, we got a handle on it and finished it on a high."
Toro Rosso
Alexander Albon: "Today was up there with one of my all-time great experiences! It's been a really good day. At the start I was thinking to myself 'don't spin it this morning', and that's exactly what I did! It was really tricky out there because the track was so cold that you couldn't drive slowly - as soon as you drive too slow your tyres get cold, it becomes unpredictable and it's like driving on ice. Once I got into my rhythm it was a smooth day and we had no issues, apart from a couple of spins later on, but I was just exploring the limits to see what the car was capable of. I did a few laps on Wednesday for our Filming Day, so today wasn't a totally new experience to drive an F1 car, and I've also been in the simulator many times, so I had a general idea of what the car could do. However, the high speed of the car is definitely new to me and it was a bit of a positive shock - I'm enjoying it a lot! I'm still smiling from when I got out of the car and I'll continue smiling throughout tonight until tomorrow!"
Jody Egginton (Deputy Technical Director): "Today was the first proper day in the car for Alex and I think he would agree it has been both productive and enjoyable for him. Following a hiccup during the install which - to be fair to Alex - was not of his making, he quickly got a feel for the car, the track conditions and the tyres, which we know in these cold temperatures is not easy. From this point onwards, Alex quickly gained confidence building on this through the day, completing his program with a good number of laps. The power unit has once again run very smoothly all day and we managed to get through a number of important test items learning more about the way the car is behaving. This has given us some strong leads on directions in which to investigate in the short and medium term. The priority remains to continue to run through the large number of tests to characterise the various areas of the car and, in parallel, the accumulation of mileage. As such, we are not looking too closely at performance levels right now, but we are satisfied with the progress made today. Daniil will step back in tomorrow to continue where Alex left off and we are looking forwards to learning more about our 2019 package."
Toyoharu Tanabe (Honda F1 Technical Director): "Between our two teams, we completed 224 trouble free laps today, which is encouraging. Today, we continued to work on PU settings, partly based on what we saw from yesterday's data. Albon was having his first run in the car, therefore another important job was to optimise the PU settings to suit his driving style. In fact, for Alex it was an especially valuable session, as he was having his first full day driving a Formula 1 car and he did well to complete 132 laps."
Lance Stroll: "It was great to be back in the car after a few months and to get down to work. It's a special feeling when you head down the pit lane for the first time in the new car and release the pit limiter. The general first impression is positive and we worked through the programme covering lots of laps with good reliability. It's early days working trackside with the team so I'm still building up my relationship with some of the crew and understanding how the team likes to approach things, but I already feel comfortable. I didn't really get a good feel for the new aero rules on these cars yet because I didn't run in traffic very much, but that's something I will understand better over the next few days."
Tom McCullough, Performance Engineering Director: "Overall, today was a positive day in which we had a reliable car and managed to achieve the objectives we had set out in our plan. Most of our focus was on understanding the car and catching up on some of the time we lost yesterday. Our run plan was dominated by aero data gathering, which is essential with a new car. We ticked all the boxes and we have lots of data to analyse as we continue in this learning process. It was Lance's first day in the RP19 and he hit the ground running. It was the first chance for him to get up to speed with the car and our procedures. The extensive simulator work during the off-season helped prepare him to have a valuable first day and to build the relationship with the team members who will work with him this season."
Alfa Romeo
Alfa Romeo headed into the second day with Antonio Giovinazzi in the C38.
Antonio completed a total of 101 laps throughout the day, with the focus having been on set-up work and aerodynamic tests. Like yesterday, the car proved to be reliable and showed a good performance. The team feels confident after their second day on track and continues to focus on making progress.
Antonio Giovinazzi: "It was a great experience to drive my own Formula One car for the first time and I look forward to developing it together with our team throughout this season. We are at the beginning of the testing process, so we tried out some different aerodynamic configurations to learn about the behaviour of the car. I felt very comfortable in it, and we put in a good number of laps. Overall, it was a positive day and I look forward to being in the car again on Thursday."
McLaren
Another valuable day for McLaren, as Lando Norris got behind the wheel of the MCL34 for the first time and completed 104 laps.
Like yesterday, the MCL34 was the first car out on track. Lando's programme started with aero correlation, and continued with more data capture and analysis of the information Carlos gathered yesterday.
In the afternoon session, the team moved to a series of longer runs and pit-stop practice, a first for Lando in testing.
The team completed its scheduled test programme, and will de-brief and prepare the car overnight for Carlos to return to the cockpit tomorrow.
Lando Norris: "Being my first time in the car, I'm pretty happy with how today has gone. The team has done an awesome job getting everything together, and over the last two days we've done a lot of mileage, which is the best thing we can hope for.
"The times aren't important to us, it's about getting through the plans we have to do, especially in this part of the season when there are a lot of new things on the car to test.
"I've not done much long running in the past or pit-stops, so getting up to speed and talking to my engineers are the most important things for me to get on top of over the next two weeks. Laps, mileage and reliability are the main objectives, as well as getting to know the car.
"There are still a lot of things we need to continue to work on and improve over the next few days. It's definitely a work in progress."
Gil de Ferran, Sporting Director: "Today was another decent day under our belts, where we racked up some good mileage and continued to explore the MCL34, as well as the 2019 tyres. Given the weather, track conditions are not always representative, nevertheless, we're still able to do some useful learning.
"On his first day in the car, Lando equipped himself well and quickly got into a rhythm. It's good for the team to now have feedback from both drivers, as well as the data from two full days of testing, to help us further our understanding not only of the car and Renault power unit, but also the individual requirements of the drivers.
"We're all heads down and fully focussed, and hopefully tomorrow will be another valuable day."