Australian Grand Prix - Practice, Friday
Weather: wet track in the morning, dry in the afternoon,
21-22°C Air, 22-31°C Track
Melbourne (AUS). The first day of practice for the 2007 Formula
One season began under changing weather conditions. After
rain during the night and in the early morning the 5.3 kilometre
long Albert Park track was wet. For the first of the two 90
minute test sessions Nick Heidfeld shared duties with the
team's test and reserve driver, Sebastian Vettel, for whom
the circuit was new territory. In the afternoon Robert Kubica
joined Nick and at the end of the two sessions all the drivers
felt this was a positive start to the first race of the season.
Nick Heidfeld:
BMW Sauber F1.07-05 / BMW P86/7
1. Training: 17., 1.37,249 min / 2. Training: 5., 1.27,970
min
"I'm happy so far with the first day of the 2007 season.
It looks like we have been able to confirm the positive impressions
we had from our testing. In the morning the car was good in
the rain, while in the afternoon session we almost completed
our programme and the lap times were also okay. I lost some
time in the garage due to an exhaust problem, but this wasn't
too bad."
Robert Kubica:
BMW Sauber F1.07-04 / BMW P86/7
2. Training: 9., 1.28,281 min
"I didn't run this morning, which was not a problem as
it was wet, but the car was quite good at the beginning of
the afternoon session. It is looking quite okay even though
we have a few issues to resolve. We now have to analyse everything,
improve the set up and I am sure we will be okay. I think
we have a good chance for points here and so it will be a
good start to the season."
Sebastian Vettel:
BMW Sauber F1.07-03 / BMW P86/7
1. Training: 3., 1.30,857 min
"At the beginning of the session the conditions were
extremely difficult. The entire track was very wet when I
left the garage in the morning and, as Albert Park is not
a permanent race track, it has a lot of white lines which
are extremely slippery in the wet. The track dried out surprisingly
quickly, but due to the changing conditions we could not collect
as much information as we would have liked. But at least we
showed we were pretty quick under wet conditions."
Willy Rampf (Technical Director):
"Finally the 2007 season has officially started. We are
pleased with the first day of practice. Our focus was on the
tyre comparison and because of this we did several short and
long runs. Now we know what we have to concentrate on in the
third practice on Saturday. The results we had from running
with the Bridgestone tyres during the winter testing are now
being confirmed here. Due to the weather conditions and some
interruptions we didn't complete a hundred percent the scheduled
programme."
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