Barcelona II, day 1: Team and driver quotes

Force India Mercedes

Sahara Force India resumed its Barcelona test programme today with Nico Hülkenberg clocking up 121 laps with a best time of 1:25.336. Sergio Perez takes over driving duties tomorrow.

Nico Hülkenberg

“It was a good day and we were able to get through a big testing plan. We had quite a few different objectives and specific items we wanted to look at, so to be able to do all that was a positive. We continue to build our understanding of the VJM09 and we explore ways to adapt to its behaviour: it’s the usual learning process that takes place when you have a new car and you start developing it for the season. In the afternoon we were able to complete some long runs which were useful to learn about the way the tyres work.”

Tom McCullough, Chief Race Engineer

“Another routine day of testing with ideal weather conditions for this time of year. The car ran reliably throughout the day and we covered 121 laps. We dedicated the early morning running to aero data correlation and fitted various test sensors to the VJM09. We then moved on to general set-up work and focussed on long run performance and further understanding of the 2016 tyres. Although the temperatures we see in these winter tests are not especially representative, it still gives us a reasonable idea of what we can expect from the early races. We need to analyse most of the tyre data tonight so that we can continue with the programme tomorrow with Sergio.”

Toro Rosso Ferrari

Phil Charles (Chief Engineer)

“It’s been another good day for us. We spent the morning characterising some new aero parts. This is another good job from the factory to get those delivered to us in time after the very busy winter we’ve had. The rest of the day was a nice mix of set-up work followed by long-runs in the afternoon. We are spending more time on these, building our understanding of the car. There’s perhaps still a bit of work to do on the tyres, but all in all we’ve learned quite a lot and the reliability has been a real positive for today, adding a further 144 laps to the team’s tally.”

Max Verstappen

“It was a very good day! We completed plenty of laps and I think we can be very happy. Everything was running smoothly and we were able to go through the whole of our programme, which is always something positive to do. We tested a few parts and it was, all in all, a very productive day. Physically I’m also feeling good and I can’t wait to be back in the car on Thursday – that will be my last time at the wheel of the STR11 before heading to Australia!”

Red Bull Renault

After a busy weekend of analysis following last week’s first outings in the Red Bull Racing-TAG Heuer RB12, Daniil Kvyat today got our final four days of preparation for the start of the season underway in Barcelona. And despite a compromised morning session, due to a brake duct issue, the Russian driver posted a respectable 69 laps of the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya on his way to a best time of 1:25.049, set on soft compound tyres.

Commenting on his penultimate test day before the season-opener in Melbourne, Dany said: “We had a busy afternoon, which was good. We would obviously have liked to have done some more laps, but there is another day left available to me and I’ll try to make that as busy as possible. This morning we had a little bit of an issue with the brake ducts and it took a little bit of time to sort it out, but the guys did a good job and for the rest of the day there were absolutely no issues.”

Head of Race Engineering, Guillaume Rocquelin added: “Not a fantastic first day back at the track for us, as in the morning we had a brake system issue. It wasn’t a major issue – the fault was easy to rectify – but unfortunately there was some damage to one corner of the car and we therefore had to strip the back end, which was quite time consuming. When we got out in the afternoon we got stuck into the programme we had set for the day and we had a good second half to the day. Dany also had a run on the soft tyre. There was no suggestion of chasing lap time, but we just wanted to get a little bit more data. In all, not an ideal start to these final days in Barcelona but we’ll keep plugging away.

Williams Mercedes

Rod Nelson, Chief Test & Support Engineer

Today was a very good day for us. The car ran faultlessly. We did lots of quite significant tests throughout the day as well as a bit of a qualifying simulation. We managed to get through our planned programme without any major problems, so overall we are really pleased.

Valtteri Bottas

It was a good day today. We managed to run without any major issues with the car. It was very interesting discovering more about the FW38 and what kind of set-ups work for this car. I think we managed to make progress. We did some short runs today which I really enjoyed. I still agree with what I said last week – we have improved in the areas where we were weak last year. I am looking forward to tomorrow and continuing testing.

Renault F1

Renault Sport Formula One Team completed the first day of the second and final pre-season test at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya with Kevin Magnussen back in action. Kevin completed a bumper 119 laps with a best lap time of 1min 25.760secs. Kevin Magnussen will be in action once more tomorrow.

Kevin Magnussen

“It was another strong day with lots of laps completed. There’s a positive feeling with this car but equally we know where we need to make improvements and that’s what we’re working towards. It’s great to be able to get so much mileage for myself and the team as we can really make good progress.”

Nick Chester, Chassis Technical Director

“A pretty good day for us with the car running reliably and completing 119 laps. We were able to work on both front and rear suspension set up as well as aero data logging which will give us further direction for the remainder of the test. All of today’s programme has been completed so there is a satisfying amount of data to process ahead of tomorrow.”

Manor Mercedes

Rio Haryanto ploughed through a condensed testing programme this afternoon after losing most of the morning session to an oil leak. He managed 45 laps in the MRT05 as the team gave chassis 02 its first outing. He ended the day 12th, his best lap time a 1:27.625.

Rio Haryanto

“This afternoon has been really positive, so that has made up for the track time we lost this morning to an oil leak. That’s what testing is for though so I’m happy that we quickly identified and got on top of the problem. We managed 43 laps this afternoon and as well as the core programme I worked through some controls procedures including practice starts. Pre-season testing is short so every lap counts but with one more day in the car to focus on race simulation and qualifying preparation, my confidence with the car and team is improving all the time.”

Dave Ryan, Racing Director

“We encountered our first significant testing glitch this morning when an oil leak disrupted our programme. The leak itself was pretty straightforward to deal with but the source was difficult to reach and that’s where we lost the time. Once fixed, we turned the car around quite quickly and managed to get Rio back out for a lap before the break to make sure we were on top of the problem for the afternoon. Rio responded well to the challenge of playing catch-up and his calm and focused approach contributed to a very smooth rest of day. Although we lost some valuable mileage, we’re in a good place for the start of this week’s test.”

Sauber Ferrari

Programme: Roll-out, installation and system checks, data collection

Felipe Nasr

“It was a productive roll-out day with the new Sauber C35-Ferrari - with more than 100 laps on the Barcelona Circuit. As usual on the first day of testing with the new car, we focussed on several installation and system checks, on set-up changes and, of course, on data collection. It was an extensive programme, on medium and soft tyres, from which we obtained interesting data to look into. For the following test days there is still a lot of work to do.”

What comes next:

Tomorrow, Marcus Ericsson will be behind the wheel of the Sauber C35-Ferrari.

McLaren Honda

Today, Fernando Alonso returned to the cockpit for the first day of the second and final pre-season test at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. Like last week, the weather was dry and sunny all day, although it started off cold, which meant the track temperatures were low early on in the morning session.

The focus of today’s running was to bed in a new power unit, which had been slightly updated from last week’s to move closer to the specification scheduled to run at the first grand prix in Melbourne. Much of the day’s programme concentrated on engine mode and driveability tests, tyre compound assessments as well as aerodynamic set-up changes.

A technical glitch halted running just before the lunch break, when an electronics issue caused the car to lose telemetry data. This was identified and reset over lunch and Fernando returned to the track shortly after 15:00.

Despite some niggles in the afternoon as the new power unit bedded into the chassis, today’s run programme was concluded successfully, and Fernando completed a total of 93 laps.
Tomorrow, Jenson Button will once again take over the driving duties as the team continues the MP4-31 test programme.

Fernando Alonso

“After the disappointment of not being able to complete much running at the end of last week’s test, it was positive to get so many laps on the board today.

“We tested a number of different configurations and spent a lot of time working on the power unit and collecting data from the aerodynamics. It’s too early to tell a real difference compared to the engine last week, as we focussed today on shorter runs and adjusting the balance and set-up of the car.

“However, today’s full day of running has been a good start to the second test, and has provided us with lots of useful data that we can analyse overnight before Jenson continues the programme tomorrow.”

Matt Morris - Director of Engineering

“After a busy and long weekend for the whole team out here at the track, back at MTC and in Sakura, we started the second test off on a positive note. It’s always encouraging to get some good mileage under our belt on the first day.

“We spent a good chunk of the day evaluating the power unit functionality, although our attention hasn’t yet turned to assessing outright performance. The important thing was to get as many miles on this package as possible, so from that point of view and the amount of data we have collected today, it has been very positive.

“We will continue to maximise our track time over the coming days, to work on ironing out reliability niggles and move on to longer runs. We also have some new aero parts arriving overnight, which will be assessed on track tomorrow with Jenson.”

Yusuke Hasegawa

“We had an unexpected control electronics shutdown just before lunch time, believed to be the cause of a software problem. Apart from that, we were able to run a decent amount of laps to finish the first day of the second test in Barcelona.

“On the power unit side, we tested many different modes of running to prepare for the race, so it was a busy day for the system engineers. As a package, we were able to test different balances of the car and tyres together with the power unit.

“We are looking to perform further detailed checks on the power unit during tomorrow’s testing."

Mercedes

Productive opening day at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya as Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg continue to rack up the mileage in the new Mercedes-Benz F1 W07 Hybrid Silver Arrow

MERCEDES AMG PETRONAS kicked off the second pre-season test of the 2016 season today at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, with Nico Rosberg at the wheel of the Mercedes-Benz F1 W07 Hybrid in the morning and Lewis Hamilton in the cockpit during the afternoon.

— Nico emerged for his first run at 09:00, completing 82 laps before the hour-long lunch break at 13:00.
— Lewis completed a further 90 laps in the afternoon – finishing for the day at 18:00
— Today’s programme focused on lower fuel running during the morning (including running soft tyres for the first time during the winter) and a race simulation in the afternoon
— Mercedes-Benz Power Units today completed a total of 2146 km
— Lewis will be at the wheel of the F1 W07 Hybrid tomorrow morning, Nico in the afternoon

Nico Rosberg

It was a decent morning and we’re making progress. It was nice for me to be able to push some more and produce some stronger lap times. We were doing qualifying practice this morning – it’s important to practise that as well. And that’s when it’s all the more enjoyable; taking the car to the limit and really pushing. It’s been a good test, reliability has been good, the speed has been there – it’s all working to plan.

Lewis Hamilton

It was a great afternoon of running with great mileage. We did a race simulation and after that I feel I’m ready for race one. The car is feeling great and was consistent all day. It’s been a monumental effort from this team to get the car to where it is today. I’m truly grateful to everyone for every bit of work they have put in so far.

Ferrari

This was the first of four days of running that will bring winter testing to a close. Kimi Raikkonen was at the wheel of the SF16-H and by the end of the day he had completed 72 laps, the quickest in 1.24.836. The day began with aero flow measurements and continued with various set-up tests until the lunch break. In the afternoon, around 3pm, the car stopped on the main straight. A stuck transmission was identified and fixed and Raikkonen was then able to continue driving. The Medium compound tyre was used throughout the day, including runs on the prototype version supplied by Pirelli, which were identifiable with a white band. The final hour saw more work on set-up and electrical settings as well as practice starts and pit stops. Tomorrow it’s Sebastian Vettel’s turn, as the drivers are alternating over the four days.

Kimi Raikkonen

“It is normal to have some little issues during testing like we had with the gearbox today, but I am not concerned as we have time to fix it. That’s the purpose of testing, learning new things and trying something different. We still have something to be done of course but it is a normal process this time of the year. It is a different story when we go racing. We will know pretty soon what will happen in Australia but so far the car feels good. I have no idea what the others are doing, lap times may vary with different tyres and fuel levels, but we know what we are doing and we are pretty happy with the way the car is handling. I think we have a very good package, time will tell if it is good enough.”

Haas Ferrari

Esteban Gutiérrez was held to just 23 laps in preseason testing Tuesday at Circuit de Barcelona – Catalunya due to a fuel system issue.

Gutiérrez recorded a best lap of 1:26.661 during his third run of the morning session, set on the Pirelli P Zero White medium tire, the favored compound for the majority of the morning’s participants.

The VF-16 sat out the afternoon session as the team worked to rectify the problem with its fuel system.

Esteban Gutierrez

"It wasn’t an ideal day as we had some technical issues which we’re still investigating. We wanted to do a lot of running and had setup work planned. However, we’re working on our solutions and focusing on the next few days so we can get our program completed. Tomorrow is another day. The team is working hard to solve the issues and I’m confident we will. Hopefully, we can have a smoother day tomorrow.”

Gunther Steiner

"Unfortunately in the morning we experienced some problems with the fuel system. We tried to fix it but we were unable to and had to stop running just before the lunch break. We will not be able to run again until tomorrow, so a little bit of a setback. But what makes you suffer makes you stronger. We take a step back, but we hope to make two forward tomorrow.”

Next Up

Gutiérrez completes his stint behind the wheel of VF-16 Wednesday with teammate Romain Grosjean taking over for the remainder of the test, which lasts through Friday.

After testing, teams prepare for Round 1 of the 2016 FIA Formula One World Championship – the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne. Practice begins March 18, qualifying takes place March 19 and the race runs March 20.