Catalunya, day 2: Perez puts McLaren on top

McLaren’s new signing Sergio Perez ran quickest on day two of Formula One’s second pre-season test, the Mexican driver lapping the Circuit de Catalunya in 1:21.848, three tenths ahead of Red Bull Racing’s Sebastian Vettel.

Perez posted his time on soft tyres in the early part of the afternoon session, dropping Vettel, who had dominated the morning session with a series of short runs, to second on the timesheet.

Vettel’s day was hampered by a series of stoppages, however, the RB9 spending long periods in the garage and afterwards the champion admitted it had not been the smoothest day, especially as the team was forced to abandon their programme half an hour before the end of the afternoon session when Vettel pulled over following a pit stop.

“We had some issues with reliability today and we couldn’t do as many laps as we wanted, but I think it’s better that this kind of thing happens today rather than in Australia,” said Vettel, who still managed 84 laps. “We stopped the car once as we saw a small loss of pressure. The second stop towards the end of the day caused a red flag and it simply took too much time to turn everything around, so we couldn’t get out again.”

Elsewhere, Kimi Raikkonen had an even more frustrating day with his Lotus being garage-bound until half way through due to more problems with gearbox electronics, which caused the team to switch out the entire unit in the morning.

Eventually the Finn was able toi get in some running, completing 43 laps and climbing to third on the timesheet, which he said proved the troubled car is at least quick.

“If yesterday wasn’t an ideal day then today was more of the same,” said Raikkonen. “Fortunately, once we were able to get a lap in we could see that the car has good pace. We test to find any problems so in that respect we’re doing a good job, but it’s frustrating. It’s no secret that we want to get more laps on the board and that’s the target for the rest of this test and the final sessions next week.”

Lewis Hamilton landed the day’s fourth-fastest time, eight tenths off the time of Perez, and also registered the days’ largest lap total, with 121 tours completes by the time the clock ran out on the day’s work. The Mercedes driver set his quickest time just before lunch during a ten-lap run on the hard compound Pirelli tyre.

“We’re making continual steps forward in terms of our understanding of the set-up and the tyres,” he said. “The hard compound work in particular was pretty good today, although all of tyres are showing degradation, so looking after them isn’t easy. The guys are working really hard both here and at the factory, and it’s encouraging to see the amount of work that’s being put in.”

The top five was rounded Fernando Alonso, while Valtteri Bottas was sixth-fastest for Williams and the Finn was impressed with the feel of the team’s new FW35.

“Straight out of the box I knew we had made a step forward from last year, and I am looking forward to working to develop the car even further,” he said. “It’s great to know we have a really good base to start from but there are still a number of areas we can improve upon, so I’m really excited for the season ahead.”

Daniel Ricciardo finished the day in seventh place with a lap of 1:23.718, just under two tenths ahead of Force India’s Paul Di Resta. Nico Hulkenberg was ninth for Sauber, ahead of Marussia’s Max Chilton and Caterham’s Charles Pic.

Caterham Renault

Charles Pic: "My second day in the car in Barcelona was a positive step from yesterday but we still have work to do to get the car’s performance to where we want it to be by Melbourne. After losing some time on day one it was important to get as many kilometres done as possible and completing 102 laps gives us a lot of data to work through and will help us progress over the next two days of this test, and to prepare for next week.

"There are definitely positives to take from my two days on track this week, and with every lap I’m getting more comfortable in the car and with the whole team. There are a few areas for us to look at to extract more performance, but this week hasn’t been about times, it’s been focused on working through various setup options and understanding the tyres which are going to be as important this year as they were in 2012. We will continue that work next week and I’m sure we’ll make more progress there."

Williams Renault

Mike Coughlan, Technical Director: It was a trouble-free day for us with Valtteri completing close to 100 laps, so we are pleased with the reliability of the FW35. Valtteri confirmed the potential of the car posting some competitive times throughout the day. After initially concentrating on aero testing, our focus then switched to set-up work and the tyres this afternoon. We are pleased with the progress we are making as a team and we have a good direction to continuing developing the car ahead of the season.

Valtteri Bottas: I had a really strong first impression of the FW35 today. Once we completed the aero work this morning I was able to complete my first proper run to feel the FW35 and the improvements we have made. Straight out of the box I knew we had made a step forward from last year, and I am looking forward to working to develop the car even further. It’s great to know we have a really good base to start from but there are still a number of areas we can improve, so I’m really excited for the season ahead.

The Williams F1 Team will be back on track tomorrow, Thursday 21 February, with Pastor Maldonado driving in the morning session and Valtteri Bottas driving the afternoon session for the third day of the test.

Mercedes

Lewis Hamilton completed 121 laps today, the equivalent of 563 kms, on the second day of the Barcelona test.

— The morning focused on comparisons between exhaust configurations, running primarily on the hard tyres
— During the afternoon, Lewis concentrated on set-up work with longer runs on the medium compound
— Lewis’ fastest lap of 1:22.726 was set at the start of a ten-lap run on the hard tyre just before lunchtime

Nico Rosberg will be back in the car for the third day of the test tomorrow.

Lewis Hamilton: We had a good day today and it was nice to get so many laps in. We’re making continual steps forward in terms of our understanding of the set-up and the tyres. The hard compound work in particular was pretty good today, although all of tyres are showing degradation so looking after them isn’t easy. The guys are working really hard both here and at the factory, and it’s encouraging to see the amount of work that’s being put in. We’re focusing on our own programme and just getting on with it.

Ferrari

Second day of testing for Scuderia Ferrari and the ten other Formula 1 teams, running at the Catalunya circuit, on the outskirts of Barcelona.

Fernando Alonso was again at the wheel of the F138: the Spaniard did fewer kilometres than on the first day, because of a problem with an exhaust pipe, that prevented him from getting through all the day’s planned programme. Nevertheless, he did 76 laps, the quickest in a time of 1.23.247, acquiring useful data relating to car development and a comparison of the Pirelli tyres.

Testing continues tomorrow at this circuit, again with the Spaniard on track.

Marussia Cosworth

Day Two of this week’s Barcelona Test got underway in cold and frosty conditions at the Circuit de Catalunya this morning. It wasn’t long before the track and air temperatures started to hot up, however the Marussia F1 Team’s programme for the day was a slow and steady exploration of practice starts and other work to evaluate the various systems and procedures. The short runs this necessitated meant that the driver of the day, Max Chilton, was laps-limited and he was unable to progress into the performance programme. In light of this, the engineering team may restructure the plan for the next two days.

Max Chilton: “The work that we have been doing today is very important for improving some of the on-car systems but we’ve focused more on shorter runs and we weren’t able to get into the tyre evaluation and set-up work that were part of my programme. I did have the chance for one quick lap right at the end, which moved us ahead of Caterham on the timesheet, and that’s why it would have been good to complete that part of the programme. It’s been a good day in terms of what we have learned though as all data is good data at this important phase of our development.”

John Booth, Team Principal, Marussia F1 Team: “Today has been one of those days where the benefit of our efforts is perhaps more evident within the engineering community rather than to the outside world looking in. On paper, we have obviously completed less mileage than some of the other teams and we haven’t been able to focus on outright performance. Max was only able to begin this work right at the very end of the day and his lap was good for P9, which is a nice reward for what has been a rather laborious programme for him. We have ticked off some important items on our pre-season checklist but we do have some set-up work that we need to complete with Max, so we will likely restructure the remaining two days of the test. We are pleased with the information we have been gathering and how this is being rolled back into the development programme for the next test and beyond. It’s good to be exploring all facets of the new car in a testing situation and to be making clear progress with any issues or areas for improvement.”

Toro Rosso Ferrari

Daniel Ricciardo had his second and final day at the wheel for this particular test session, continuing the programme begun yesterday. One of the key requirements of the STR8 was to give the drivers a more user-friendly car with a wider range of settings than its predecessor: with this in mind, today’s programme centred on experimenting with that wider range and evaluating different suspension set-up options. So far we have not experienced any reliability issues with the new car.

Daniel Ricciardo: “A very productive day, testing various suspension options, which was very interesting and has provided us with plenty of data to look at. Therefore it was not a day for the time sheets, but one during which we learned a lot. It’s been interesting evaluating the Pirelli tyres, which have different characteristics to those from last year, but we will need some higher temperatures before we get an accurate picture of how they perform. Now it’s down to Jean-Eric to carry on for the next couple of days, before I get my final two days of testing when we come back here in just over one week.”

Sauber Ferrari

Nico spent quite a bit of the morning session with aero evaluations. Later in the morning and in the afternoon the main focus was on set-up and tyre work. He completed 88 laps.

Tom McCullough, Head of Track Engineering: "Today we tested some new aero and mechanical components and were also working again on the Hard and Medium tyre compounds. Even though we had some downtime due to small mechanical problems, we achieved the majority of our testing plan including many pit stop simulations in the afternoon.”

Nico Hülkenberg: "We got a lot done, but also had some issues today. I did quite a lot of running, but it was difficult because the tyres degraded quite quickly. In addition, it was not easy for us today to use the full potential of the tyres on a single quick lap. There is definitely room for improvement."

Tomorrow, Nico Hülkenberg will continue drivring, while Esteban will be back at the wheel on Friday.

Lotus Renault

Kimi Räikkönen concluded his second day of running at Barcelona with a gearbox problem keeping him off the track for much of the morning and part of the afternoon session at the Circuit de Catalunya.

Whilst the team ultimately diagnosed and rectified the issue, vital running time was lost. Once Kimi did get out on track, he immediately set the third fastest lap time, which is where he ended the day.

Romain will take the wheel of E21 chassis 02 for the next two days

Kimi Räikkönen: “If yesterday wasn’t an ideal day then today was more of the same. Fortunately, once we were able to get a lap in we could see that the car has good pace. We test to find any problems so in that respect we’re doing a good job, but it’s frustrating. It’s no secret that we want to get more laps on the board and that’s the target for the rest of this test and the final sessions next week.”

Alan Permane, Trackside Operations Director: “Our target was more laps today and we’ve missed that. We were able to diagnose a problem with the gearbox, but rectifying this took quite a lot of time. This severely affected our plans for the day but yet again we were able to show we have a quick car. On the positive side, there were no further problems with telemetry as we experienced yesterday and the second gearbox ran reliably in the afternoon. Tomorrow we will try to rack up the laps with evaluation work and a race distance simulation.”

McLaren Mercedes

Sergio Perez concluded his running at the Circuit de Catalunya, racking up 97 laps after an extremely productive day.

As usual, the morning kicked off with a series of shorter runs, aimed at gaining the engineers a better understanding of the car’s track-to-tunnel aero correlation and its reaction to a series of mechanical set-up changes.

Into the afternoon, the team ran through a number of longer runs – these were aimed at providing Sergio with a better understanding of the methods and systems that will be used by the race team during a race weekend, including cockpit switch adjustments and understanding radio messaging.

Jenson Button kicks off his running at Barcelona tomorrow. His programme will pick up where Checo’s left off, including further correlation and set-up work. With poorer weather on the horizon for Friday, the team will monitor the forecast and may choose to adapt the programme in order to optimise track time over the next two days.

Force India Mercedes

Sahara Force India completed a second day of work in Barcelona as Paul Di Resta remained in the VJM06. Tomorrow Adrian Sutil takes over driving duties before Jules Bianchi gets his chance for the final day on Friday.

Paul Di Resta: “We stopped a little bit early today, but we still got plenty of running under our belt and we’re learning more and more about the car as we go along – that’s what winter testing is all about. Understanding the tyres is always a priority and we’re getting a feel for the degradation rates, which have been quite high, although we have to remember that the track temperatures here are lower than we can expect at most races. We’ve run most of the tyres apart from the super-softs so far. Learning about the tyres and a new car at the same time is never easy, but we’re pretty pleased with how things have gone during the first couple of days.”

Jakob Andreasen, Chief Race Engineer: “Another routine day of winter testing, starting with the usual aero work this morning, short runs before lunch, and longer runs this afternoon. We had a few small reliability issues with the car, which meant we were a bit short on our lap count for the day, but overall we covered off a lot of test items during the day and tried some different set-up directions with the car. The track conditions have been reasonable with the temperatures in the mid-twenties for most of the day, and we’ve concentrated on understanding the tyres as much as we can. The new compounds are a challenge for all the teams, but we’re getting the information we need to be ready for Melbourne.”

Red Bull Renault

The second day of testing at Barcelona’s Circuit de Catalunya was a mixed bag for Infiniti Red Bull Racing as Sebastian Vettel claimed P2 on the timesheet, but the team was forced to end its programme early when Sebastian had to stop on track late in the afternoon.

Sebastian Vettel: “We had some issues with reliability today and we couldn’t do as many laps as we wanted, but I think it’s better that this kind of thing happens today rather than in Australia. It was nothing disastrous, just small things that hampered us today. We stopped the car once as we saw a small loss of pressure. The second stop towards the end of the day caused a red flag and it simply took too much time to turn everything around, so we couldn’t get out again.”

Race Engineering Co-ordinator Andy Damerum said: “The stops we had today weren’t too serious and we’ll have everything sorted for tomorrow. We know where the issues are. However, though we would obviously much rather have had a smooth run today we still accomplished a lot and even managed to slot in some more test items in the afternoon, which we put on the car at lunch time. So, while it wasn’t an ideal day, we did get through most of what we wanted to. Seb now makes way for Mark tomorrow.”