Our Faenza home is still in the grip of winter with snow fall continuing, but today Spain once again showed why it’s the best venue for winter testing, producing another beautiful warm sunny day for the start of the second of three pre-season test sessions.
As in Jerez, here at the Circuit de Catalunya outside Barcelona, it fell to Daniel Ricciardo to be the first to drive the STR7 and he posted the fourth fastest time of the day in 1.23.618. The Aussie rattled off 76 laps before the car let him down at the side of the track with an hour remaining, but he will be out tomorrow morning to get in some more miles.
The engineers are still learning what kind of car they’ve got in the shape of the STR7, seeing how it reacts to set up changes and how different fuel loads affect its behaviour. On top of this work, we can’t forget we have to be race-ready as a team in just over three weeks time. Therefore, apart from the purely technical side of developing a new car, we have also worked on running through procedures that are part and parcel of a race weekend, including carrying out certain tasks in the limited time available on a Grand Prix timetable.
After today’s session came to an end, while the engineers and drivers had their usual technical debrief in the truck, our mechanics were still working hard in the pit lane, as the team manager took them through the daily ritual of pit-stop practice.
Only Hispania are not here, with Mercedes unveiling their new car this morning and Marussia appearing at a test for the first time. In fact, it was this latter team’s rookie driver, Frenchman Charles Pic who gets today’s prize for the hardest working driver, completing 121 laps.
Second Winter Test Gets Underway