Hard to believe, but there are only eight more days of winter testing before the cars and teams head off for Melbourne and the start of another season.
These initial four days of running at Jerez de la Frontera, seemingly the only part of Europe not lying under a blanket of snow at the moment, have simply flown by, since we first pulled the wraps off the STR7 on the red carpet outside our garage on Monday evening.
Working pretty much around the clock, Scuderia Toro Rosso can now head to Barcelona with an extensive amount of data under its belt. In the course of the four days in southern Spain, Daniel Ricciardo, on the first two days and Jean-Eric Vergne on the final two, completed a total of 317 laps, amounting to 1402 kilometres. Reliability was pretty good for a new car, with no major problems rearing their head and that’s how we clocked up these big distances.
It is much too early to talk about performance, although clearly the car is not the slowest, but there is much to do to fine tune all elements of the package, not to mention getting a clear picture on how the Pirelli tyres – slightly different to last year’s – will behave. Clearly, running on a track whose surface was as cold as the inside of a fridge for most of the mornings, means there are many aspects of car performance that still remain a mystery.
Apart from shaking down a new car, we were also knocking a new pair of drivers into shape, even if we have some experience of working with both of them. However, for both Dan and Jev, it was the first time they had to get used to a car and at the same time deal with all the tests relating to a brand new Formula 1 machine. Both of them were with us for all four days, even when they were not driving, so they could take part in all the technical meetings to follow the development of the car. It also gave them a chance to get used to the added intensity of media work as fully fledged Grand Prix racers.
Now it’s time for the truckies to take centre stage as it’s their turn to get behind the wheel and head for the Catalunya circuit just outside Barcelona. The journey will take them a day and a half, before they fly home to Faenza having set up the trucks in the paddock that hosts the second test session from 21 to 24 February.
Eight More Days