Barcelona Test, Day 1: Team reaction

Williams Mercedes

Rod Nelson, Chief Test & Support Engineer

It was a very successful day. We’ve been doing a lot of aero testing today on development items. We also went through a programme looking at some Monaco set-up alternatives. It was a very interesting day for us with plenty of data to look through, and we got through our entire planned programme. It was good to have Alex back in the car today. He drove the FW37 last year, so it is quite interesting to hear his view of where we’re going with the FW38. It is quite a different beast, and race drivers don’t always notice the difference because they drive it every week and changes tend to be fairly marginal. For him, he is looking back several months. It is interesting to talk to him about it and get a different point of view. He did a great job for us, it was a very clean day to complete our programme. Overall, I’m feeling very positive, and now we’re looking forward to getting Felipe in the car tomorrow to carry on with the work that Alex started today.

Alex Lynn

I think we had a really positive day. We’ve run through everything, and probably more than we ever anticipated on the programme. We’ve had a lot of good running for the team in terms of the next few races, and got some good information. We did some good work on the medium tyre, and in the afternoon it was more Monaco based performance work.

Toro Rosso Ferrari

Scuderia Toro Rosso is back in action at the Catalunya track, home to the Spanish Grand Prix, for a further two days of testing.

Pierre Gasly was driving today and he will hand over driving duties to Daniil Kvyat tomorrow.

Phil Charles (Chief Race Engineer)

“Last year Pierre did a good job for us in the young driver test days and he has done another excellent day for us today. We got most of the planned program completed with a large number of aero characterization runs in the morning and then a set-up program accomplished just after lunch. His runs were consistent and his feedback was concise. We were just about to ‘set him off the leash’ for some performance runs at the end of the day when a systems issue stopped the car from running. We are currently looking into it – it’s a pity we could not get to see what Pierre is capable of.”

Pierre Gasly (Car 38)

“It’s always fantastic to drive a Formula 1 car and I’m happy with today. The most important was to do a good job for the team, as well as getting plenty of mileage under my belt. In the morning we completed aero tests and in the afternoon we focused on the car set-up. Unfortunately at the end of the day, when we were just about to go for some performance runs on Soft tyres, we had a little issue, so we had to end the day a bit earlier than planned… But I’m still pleased, as we could anyhow complete many laps today, which is always important for me to gain experience. This is my second time driving with Toro Rosso and I have to say I felt much more confident – knowing the team and the procedures better definitely helps. It doesn’t mean it’s less pressure on me, as you always need to deliver and do a good job, but the fact that it’s not completely new to me any more makes me enjoy the driving more. I look forward to another outing with the team hopefully in the near future.”

Renault F1

Renault Sport Formula One Team Third and Reserve Driver Esteban Ocon completed a bumper 105 laps behind the wheel of the R.S.16 for the first day of in-season testing at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. Esteban completed a variety of aero and suspension assessments over the course of his first day testing for the team, using only Pirelli’s medium compound tyre.

Kevin Magnussen will be in action for tomorrow’s final day of the Barcelona test.

Esteban Ocon

“It was great to be behind the wheel of the R.S.16 for an entire day. We’ve had a pretty full programme but I’d happily do the same again. We completed the second highest number of laps today and I’m happy with how everything went. Of course, it would have been great to have gone for some fast laps with low fuel and soft tyres but that wasn’t the purpose of today. The team’s happy with all the data collected so it’s been great to contribute to the development of the car.”

Nick Chester, Technical Director

“Today was all about learning as much as possible about our various aero updates, our new suspension components and our latest power unit specification. It’s been an extremely productive day on all fronts and Esteban did a great job for us. We’re looking forward to making further progress with Kevin behind the wheel tomorrow.”

Force India Mercedes

Sahara Force India completed nearly a century of laps during the first day of testing at the Circuit de Catalunya, with development driver Alfonso Celis at the wheel of the VJM09.

Alfonso Celis

“It was a very positive day with a lot of mileage and some good work with different tyre compounds. It was interesting to come back here after winter testing: the track and weather conditions are quite different and the same applies to the car, so it took a few runs to adapt. I feel more and more confident with the car, but I am still treading carefully not to make mistakes: my priority is to do the job the team is asking me to do, but hopefully I’ll be able to push a bit more tomorrow.”

Tom McCullough, Chief Race Engineer

“Alfonso did a good job for us today covering just shy of 100 laps. The morning was dedicated to aero work and test items, which involved a number of short runs to get the information we needed. The afternoon gave us the opportunity to start exploring some different set-up directions and Alfonso completed a couple of longer runs. The car ran reliably and Alfonso is working very well with the engineers giving us the feedback we need. Tomorrow’s programme will follow a similar approach to the work we’ve completed today.”

Red Bull Tag Heuer

Just two days after the team’s sensational Spanish Grand Prix win, Red Bull Racing were back in action today at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, as Formula One’s first in-season test of 2016 got underway. And at the end of a busy day of running, Daniel Ricciardo had worked through 89 laps of the Montmeló track, with the team setting about development work of the RB12 ahead of the coming races.

“So far we’re pretty happy with how it’s looking. We’ll see what they find tonight but generally it was all pretty reliable and everything ran as smoothly as it could have,” said Daniel afterwards. “We had a few new bits on the car that we tried; I guess there will have been some images of crazy stuff attached to the car this morning! But it all went pretty well. It’s not as exciting as a race weekend I can tell you, but we did some good stuff today. We got the important things out of the way and there’s another day left for the team here. Then we have three street circuits coming up, it’s going to be good fun!”

Head of Race Engineering Guillaume Rocquelin added

“We qualified and raced here at the weekend so for us performance is not a concern at this test. We’re all about medium and long-term development of the car this week in Barcelona, which is why there were no performance runs today, as well a pretty conservative choice of tyres – using what we used at the weekend. We had a lot of different rakes on the car this morning to test a variety of components and then in the afternoon it was more about consistency. As I say, it’s about development, not looking at the next event, so there was no temptation to bring out the ultrasoft tyres today. We had a good clean day, though. There was a minor issues with a sensor in the morning that needed repair but other than that it was a decent day’s work.”

Manor Mercedes

Pascal Wehrlein

“Today has been a positive day for us. We worked through a pretty big list of items to evaluate the new developments and also did some runs on the Supersoft later in the day. Obviously we didn’t run that tyre over the race weekend so it was interesting to have the comparison against the other teams with our updated package. For me it will be nice to focus on Monaco now, where I think we can have a better weekend as a result of the work we’ve done here today.”

Dave Ryan, Racing Director:

“We’ve had a good first day at what is a busy test, particularly in terms of today’s programme with Pascal. This is a chance for us to continue the evaluation of our new developments and really get to grips with the areas where we are still a little deficient so that we can keep improving. Pascal has done a good job. As ever, his feedback has been very comprehensive and our relative pace on the Supersoft is encouraging. We look forward to giving our Development Driver Jordan King his first taste of the MRT05 tomorrow.”

Mercedes

MERCEDES AMG PETRONAS began the first in-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.

— Nico emerged for his first run at 09:00, completing 54 laps before the hour-long lunch break at 13:00 and a further 65 laps in the afternoon – finishing for the day at 18:00
— Today’s programme focused on suspension and setup work using the medium compound tyre, in addition to powertrain analysis
— Mercedes-Benz Power Units today completed a total of 1,815.45km
— Mercedes-Benz Junior driver Esteban Ocon will be at the wheel of the F1 W07 Hybrid tomorrow

Nico Rosberg

It’s good to be back in the car. I learned a lot and we made good progress – which is really important, as it’s my only test day for the whole year, so I needed to make the most out of it and try to learn as much as possible. We did some suspension and setup work – just a few different small bits. I’m looking forward to the rest of the season – but my focus right is now on Monaco. We’ll have to keep an eye on our opposition as always but I’m feeling confident and aiming for another win.

McLaren Honda

After finishing in the points at Sunday’s Spanish Grand Prix, Jenson Button returned to the cockpit of the McLaren-Honda MP4-31 as the team turned its attention to the first in-season test of 2016.

Today’s test programme consisted of consolidation and preparation – with five races under our belt, the team reviewed and tested the upgrades brought to the car from the start of the season, putting in the necessary groundwork and evaluation of a number of different components as we continue our development through the European leg of the season.

Aero correlation was the name of the game this morning, with aero rakes making an appearance on the car early on. The car’s solid reliability meant longer runs and race simulations dominated the afternoon’s running

Dave Redding, Team Manager

“Today was a seamless day of testing – with both the team and car working well throughout the day, it’s satisfying that we were able to complete day one of the test according to plan.
“We’ll look to run a similar programme tomorrow with Stoffel, refining today’s work and gathering yet more data ahead of next week’s Monaco Grand Prix.”

Satoshi Nakamura, Honda R&D Co Ltd Principal Engineer

"Today’s power unit run programme consisted mainly of race set-up for the Monaco Grand Prix next weekend. The street circuit of Monaco has many slow corners which require stability in the engine’s low-revving range, so we focused on its driveability and the various modes of the power unit to bring out its full potential. Our plan is to continue to run similarly tomorrow.
We finished the day with 86 solid laps of trouble free running, and we are looking forward to the second day of testing tomorrow."

Stoffel Vandoorne gets behind the wheel of the McLaren-Honda MP4-31 at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya tomorrow.

Haas F1 Ferrari

Haas F1 Team driver Romain Grosjean logged a total of 96 laps in the first round of in-season testing Tuesday at the Circuit de Barcelona – Catalunya. Grosjean’s fastest lap (1:23.882) came on his 82nd tour around the 4.655-kilometer (2.892-mile), 16-turn circuit. It was the fourth-best time overall among the 10 drivers participating in the test.

Grosjean’s fast time was set on the Pirelli P Zero Purple ultrasoft tire, which came during his last run of the day. Pirelli will debut the ultrasofts in race conditions at the upcoming Monaco Grand Prix. Prior to running the ultrasofts, Grosjean ran a stint on the Pirelli P Zero Red supersoft tires.

Grosjean used the Pirelli P Zero White medium tires throughout the morning, where he and the team concentrated on aero mapping and chassis setup. By midday, Grosjean had toured the track 35 times with a best lap of 1:26:669.

The afternoon session brought a switch to the Pirelli P Zero Yellow soft tires as further development work on the VF-16 continued. And with the switch from softs to supersofts to ultrasofts, Grosjean’s lap times quickened with the increased grip brought by each tire compound.

Sebastian Vettel of Scuderia Ferrari set the day’s quick time (1:23.220), while Nico Rosberg of Mercedes ran the most laps (119).

Romain Grosjean, Driver No. 8, Haas F1 Team

“Plenty of laps for us today, which was great. We had a long list of things we wanted to do, mainly on aero in the morning and then getting a feel of the ultrasoft ahead of the Monaco GP. We completed all of the program, which was a great effort from the team. There’s plenty of data to look at now, so that will help us get ready for the next race. We changed the chassis and we tried everything we could, so let’s see what we get in Monaco.”

Guenther Steiner, Team Principal, Haas F1 Team

“It was a good day for us. We did almost a hundred laps, which has enabled us to gather a lot of data. I think we’re still in a learning phase. After the last few races we had to understand the tires a bit better. We’ve made great progress and we’ll continue that tomorrow with Esteban (Gutiérrez) to see that we can get the tires to work in the window they’re supposed to work. All in all, a good day for the whole team. Everyone worked hard and did a great job.”