Saturday, May 17, 2008

RAIN PROVES A REAL TEST

RAIN PROVES A REAL TEST

Trulli - set the fastest time.

Rain wrecked the final day of this week's Formula One test at the Paul Ricard circuit in France, underlined by the fact 13 seconds separated the 11 drivers on track.

The 10 teams spent the first two days of the three-day programme optimising set-up in preparation for next weekend's Monaco Grand Prix.

To conclude the test, the teams used a different configuration of the track to replicate aspects of the Gilles Villeneuve circuit in Montreal for next month's race in Canada.

Unfortunately, the weather intervened, to such an extent many of the teams were at one stage forced to use the extreme wet tyres.

Toyota's Jarno Trulli managed just 26 laps, but set the best time on the 5.255km circuit in one minute 31.360 seconds.

Explaining the situation, Trulli said: "With the first two days of this week's test devoted to Monaco preparations, we had scheduled an intensive programme today.

"Montreal is a very different type of circuit and we wanted to try out different aerodynamic and mechanical solutions.

"You run less downforce in Montreal compared to Monaco, so the car set-up is very different and we had planned a lot of work on this.

"So it was frustrating the rain came early in the day and meant we could not collect any dry data."

After 191 laps on the shorter version of the circuit yesterday, Nelson Piquet today managed 60 laps in his Renault and was second

quickest, just over a quarter of a second down on Trulli.

McLaren test driver Pedro de la Rosa was third, within 0.8secs of veteran Trulli, followed by Sebastian Vettel in the new Toro Rosso.

Felipe Massa was fifth fastest in his Ferrari, with Nick Heidfeld sixth for BMW Sauber, Red Bull tester Sebasien Buemi seventh and Giancarlo Fisichella eighth in his Force India.

Jenson Button was ninth for Honda, followed by Force India's Adrian Sutil who managed the least number of laps with 13, with Williams test driver Nico Hulkenberg bringing up the rear.



  • HAMILTON PASSES FRENCH TEST
  • KIMI SETS PACE IN FRANCE
  • No comments: