Team reaction after day one in Spa (part 1)

Ferrari

The Belgian Grand Prix meeting got off to a rainy start, which is definitely nothing new for the Spa-Francorchamps circuit. Only in the final half hour of the second free practice session was it possible to use dry weather tyres and a red flag in the final fifteen minutes further reduced the time available for the teams to evaluate the handling of the cars in these conditions.

Stefano Domenicali: Given the way things went in both sessions it is really difficult to give a correct evaluation of the situation. That is the main reason that one must be very cautious in terms of drawing any conclusions from the two sessions. From the little that was possible to understand, there are some teams that seem more competitive than previously, which could create some surprises in the first five rows of the grid. We tried to work through all our planned programme, which included evaluating some new aerodynamic components. Looking to the rest of the weekend, we can say that, as ever at this track, uncertainty over the weather could play a significant role. Finally, I take this opportunity to add, on behalf of the entire Scuderia, our congratulations to those of President Montezemolo, to our former driver, Rubens Barrichello on the occasion of his three hundredth Grand Prix participation, which is a truly significant and important milestone.

Fernando Alonso: The impression one gets on Friday does not always get confirmed on Saturday and Sunday, therefore we have to evaluate today’s results with a lot of care. Having said that, it has definitely been a positive day, because the car seems to respond well in all track conditions that we encountered today. The times count for little, or nothing at all, because when the track changes so quickly, times can improve or get worse by two or three seconds depending on the moment when you are out on the circuit.

I think the weather will play a key part, both tomorrow and on Sunday: anything could happen. We tried to test all the new components we have here. If the track was to be dry tomorrow, then we must try and improve our set-up, because obviously it is not yet at its best for these conditions, given that we only had a few minutes to test on slick tyres. In fact, I felt the car was a bit nervous, while in the wet it was easier to drive. When thinking about going for pole position, first of all we will have to see what the weather is doing: for sure if it was to rain we will go out immediately because you always learn from bad experiences.

Felipe Massa: I am very happy to be back racing at this track, having been forced to miss it last year: I love driving here. From what we could understand on a day like this, the car seems reasonably competitive and that was particularly true on the rain tyres. However, it is only Friday, so we will have to wait to see how the Red Bulls go, given that so far they have proved to be the quickest cars, as demonstrated in qualifying. We had so many things to test today, which explains a few slow laps this afternoon. On the intermediate tyres I immediately had good grip, but even on slicks the situation was not that bad. On the final lap, the only one on the soft tyres, I made a mistake, but the car felt good: obviously there is room for improvement and that is what we will try and achieve tomorrow.

Chris Dyer: It was quite a complicated day because the weather evolved continuously. On top of that came the red flag in the final part, which considerably reduced the amount of time we could run in the dry. Both drivers were reasonably pleased with the handling of the F10 in the differing conditions encountered today, which is definitely positive. We had various new components to test, but clearly with track conditions changing all the time it is harder to make a correct assessment: we will have to study the available data carefully in order to draw the right conclusions. The forecast is predicting the chance of rain for both qualifying and the race: we will have to think calmly about whether to go for a set-up that veers more towards a wet track or if it is better to opt for a more dry oriented configuration.

Force India Mercedes

Day one of the Belgian Grand Prix and the usual talking point for the majority of the day was the weather as rain, sun, further heavy rain, cloud cover and then more rain punctuated the F1 running. Force India’s Adrian Sutil however flourished in the conditions as the German driver finished fifth in the opening 90 minute session and second in the afternoon. Tonio Liuzzi, running on a different programme to Adrian, put in some productive development work on the team’s new blown diffuser and finished in 15th and 16th positions respectively.

Adrian Sutil: With the weather it was quite difficult but I enjoyed it a lot and we had a good balance straightaway. I was very comfortable and every run I went out I was one of the quickest, so a very positive start to the day. In the dry the car was just getting better as grip improved. In the second session I did a run on the hard tyre and then had time for one single lap on the soft right at the end, but there was so much traffic out on the track that getting a time was always going to be hard. But at least we have an idea about the tyres and how the car will perform on the different compounds. We know it’s going to be difficult to replicate this form tomorrow when we expect conditions to be drier but overall I’m feeling good, the car is fast and I am in good shape.

Tonio Liuzzi: Overall a difficult day, not just because of the weather, but because of the programme we were running. We had a different programme from Adrian, running with some newer development parts. We have a really good speed into the corners and the car is very balanced. The blown diffuser does the work we expect it to and is performing quite well, but we tried a few things that we still need to define before tomorrow. We are down on top speed and are losing a bit of time on the straights and of course that’s not what you want when you’re at a place like Spa that has such long straights. I’m positive for tomorrow though and looking forward to getting a complete package tomorrow.

Dominic Harlow, chief race engineer: Two wet sessions today, and a busy test programme for the team. The morning conditions permitted only running on the wet tyre, as we compared different car configurations with Adrian and Tonio. The car was quite well balanced in the wet, but we occasionally did suffer from a bit of understeer. During the afternoon the circuit became dry enough for us to use prime and option tyres, but it wasn’t really an evaluation because of the evolving circuit, yet all the same it allowed us to collect more data on the blown diffuser that seems to be working as we expected. However we will be investigating the F-duct performance on Tonio’s car this evening as there is a top speed differential between the two cars. Overall our performance seems reasonable and if we follow the conditions sensibly should be able to achieve our twin objectives of Q3 and scoring more points this weekend.

McLaren Mercedes

Lewis Hamilton: “The weather made it a bit of an up-and-down day. It started off very wet, so we didn’t do too much running in the morning. But we got a few more laps this afternoon on the Intermediates and then the Option tyre.

“Because the rules don’t allow us to use too many wet-weather tyres – we only have three Extremes and four Intermediates – we really need to look after them, so we were very cautious, just in case we need to use them later on in the weekend.

“We’re definitely making small steps forward. This track does seem to suit our car better [than in Hungary], but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. If it rains, then we seem to be competitive, but we have realistic expectations for this weekend – I didn’t score in the last race, so it’s important that we get more points on the board on Sunday.”

Jenson Button: “Considering the conditions, I think today was a reasonable day. We’ve still got some more work to do, but I’m happier with the car here than I was in the last couple of races. I’ve got a reasonable balance and a good basis to work on, and that’s important.

“We got pretty much everything Spa could throw at us today. And, despite the weather, we still got some running done on the Extreme, Intermediate and Option tyre. I’m happy with how the car felt in the different conditions – it’s a positive.

“I purposely didn’t do too many laps on either wet-weather tyre, as I didn’t want to destroy them. You can’t afford to do that. So we looked after the tyres, which could be useful for us ahead of qualifying.”

Martin Whitmarsh, Team principal: “The weather made things interesting, if challenging, today. Both our drivers were forced to conserve wet tyres in the expectation of needing them later in the weekend, which limited our running. However, they were satisfied with the balance of their cars – although in these conditions it’s almost impossible to establish competitiveness relative to rivals. So, overall, I guess I’ll just say that we’re pleased to end the day with two undamaged cars!”

Renault

Robert Kubica: It was quite a good Friday for us. The conditions in first practice were pretty bad, but our main aim was to check how the f-duct system was functioning on our car. We focused on getting experience of the system, for the engineers and for myself, and to get everything
working properly - and we managed to do this in spite of running in the wet. In the second session, I ran every type of tyre: extremes, intermediates and both compounds of the slicks.

The car felt reasonable in all conditions, but I think we can make further improvements to the balance tomorrow.

Vitaly Petrov: The first target today was to find out how the f-duct was working, and it looks pretty good. You can feel a good difference on the straights when the system is operating, and we are even driving with one hand in some of the corners. It gives the drivers a bit more work to
do in the cockpit, but it’s nothing difficult to handle. This afternoon, we started to do some setup work, but the conditions were changing all the time. Hopefully we can make more progress tomorrow, in order to get really comfortable with the car ahead of qualifying.

Technical Debrief with Alan Permane, Chief Race Engineer:

Track conditions were poor this morning. Could you do any useful running in the wet?
This is the first time that we have brought our f-duct to the track, so we spent the morning learning about it in the wet conditions, completing lots of single-lap runs to gather data. It appears to be working very well, but we will need to go through the data thoroughly tonight, and check the installation on the car, to be sure everything is functioning as expected.

Robert seemed competitive in both sessions. Does that tally with your assessment?
It’s always difficult to judge performance on Friday, because you don’t know the fuel loads that other teams are running. Robert seems happy with the car, although he is still suffering from a little understeer.

How did Vitaly’s day go?
It was a very similar story. He is running exactly the same system as Robert, but he was less happy with the balance and complained of more understeer. We still have some work to do get the car balance to his liking.

What does the weather forecast say for the rest of the weekend?
In terms of the weather, it’s been a pretty normal day at Spa! The conditions for the rest of the weekend look unsettled: on Saturday, there’s a chance of rain in the morning, and a higher probability in the afternoon; and it’s the same for Sunday. As usual, we’re expecting a mixture
of everything for the rest of the weekend.

Conditions are expected to remain cool. Will this be an issue for dry tyre warm-up?
I don’t think so. We ran both types of tyre this afternoon, and didn’t encounter any difficulties with either compound. Although we didn’t do a great deal of running, I don’t think cool conditions would pose a problem.

Red Bull Renault

Sebastian Vettel: “It’s always tricky with these conditions, track time is limited and tyres are limited. We would love to run more despite the
rain, but we don’t have so many tyres and looking at the weekend we might need them for qualifying and the race, so we didn’t want to use them all today. We were looking at the balance, it feels good, but it’s
hard when the conditions are changing. We still have some work to do for Saturday and Sunday.”

Mark Webber: “Today was a bit of a messy day with the changing conditions, but it was actually pretty good for us. We got some good
information to go through and I’m looking forward to tomorrow. There are a few quick guys out there, but we’re not slow either. It’s hard to get a feel for what everyone’s doing with the changing weather. It’s a beautiful track here, it’s special – today we got to sample it in all conditions.”

Sauber Ferrari

After a totally wet practice in the morning with some heavy downpours, the second free practice for the Belgian Grand Prix was held in mixed conditions. About half way through the second 90 minute session the drivers were changing from full wet tyres to intermediates, and in the end the conditions were even okay for slicks. Both cars and drivers performed well and the cars carried two more sponsor logos than in the last race four weeks ago – Burger King and new partner, Mad Croc.

Pedro de la Rosa: “Given the track conditions we managed to complete a lot of work including some dry running, which was very important for me as I haven’t raced here for some years. To get this chance was a bonus as we didn’t expect it. In the fully wet conditions we were pretty competitive. My conclusion from the afternoon’s session is we are good in the fast sectors one and three, but have to find something to improve the car for the middle sector. I’m very much looking forward to tomorrow and I’m curious to see what the weather will do.“

Kamui Kobayashi: “Overall it was okay for me today. We had no technical problems and quite a variety of different track conditions, which means you can learn a lot about the car and the track. In the wet my lap time was okay, but the tyres didn’t last long and that makes it difficult to judge where we are and where we should go. It is not easy to set up the car for tomorrow as here in Spa you basically can never know what the weather will finally be like. Nevertheless I have a good feeling for the car and the track.”

James Key, Technical Director: “It was obviously a very eventful day with extremely changeable weather conditions. However, it was useful with the two different sessions we had because it allowed both drivers and the team to evaluate the tyres in all conditions. We could also test different set-ups and wing settings. I think both drivers did a good job in the circumstances, as did the team. We had to change the car quite a bit to match the changing situations. It looks okay, but it’s extremely difficult to judge where everyone is, because the conditions were never consistent. Therefore we need to be cautious not to make too many judgements from today’s classification. However, we can be happy with what we have done so far. We made quite good progress. It’s now a case of sitting down and analysing the data to make the right decisions for tomorrow.”