TEST REPORT VALENCIA – WEEKLY SUMMARY
Date: Friday 17th February 2006
Location: Circuit Ricardo Tormo, Valencia, Spain
Drivers: Kimi Raikkonen and Pedro de la Rosa
Weather: Sunny and warm
Track temperature – high of 21.8 degrees Celsius
Air temperature – high of 20.1 degrees Celsius
Laps run: 194
Kilometres covered: Kimi Raikkonen approx. 320km
Pedro de la Rosa approx. 450km
Best lap time of the day and week: Kimi Raikkonen, 1m09.987
Total number of laps driven during the test: 569
Total number of km driven during the test: 2279km (Kimi 669km,
Juan Pablo 745km, Pedro 865km)
Duration of test: Four days (14th – 17th February)
Team McLaren Mercedes have completed a four day session at
the Circuit Ricardo Tormo today.
Kimi Raikkonen and Pedro de la Rosa today continued the week's
programme of set-up work and component evaluation, which covered
overall car development and specific work for the first three
races.
Kimi, who set the fastest time of the day and week with a
1m09.987, completed over 320km, whilst Pedro racked up 450km
over 113 laps. The Spaniard set the fifth quickest time of
the day. Today's running took the total for MP4-21 to approx
5100km since its first shakedown on Monday 23rd January.
The test began on Tuesday with Juan Pablo Montoya and Pedro
shaking down the second and third MP4-21 chassis, which arrived
in Valencia from the McLaren Technology Centre over the weekend.
The two MP4-21s were debuting the new Team McLaren Mercedes
chrome livery on track.
The shakedown saw Juan Pablo and Pedro complete the required
systems checks for the new cars, and then during the course
of the afternoon both drivers began to complete longer runs.
By the end of the day Juan Pablo and Pedro had covered around
600km in total.
Wednesday saw Kimi arrive in Spain to join Juan Pablo. The
Colombian's focus for the day was completing a race distance,
which included pit stop practice with the new cars. Kimi's
programme saw him work on set-up programmes for the opening
races over shorter runs, and the Finn set the second fastest
time of the day. Juan Pablo and Kimi continued testing together
on Thursday, and they covered a total of 485km.
The test programme will switch to the Circuit de Catalunya
in Barcelona next week for a three day session with Kimi and
Juan Pablo again driving two MP4-21s.
KIMI RAIKKONEN
"It has been an encouraging week at the test; I have
covered good mileage in the MP4-21 in dry track conditions
and worked through a number of development programmes with
the team. Next week I will be in Barcelona for my final test
before going to Bahrain, I have three days in the car there
and I am looking forward to carrying on with the work from
this week."
JUAN PABLO MONTOYA
"We have made some progress with our testing programme
in Valencia. I have now reached a total of nearly 750km in
the MP4-21 there this week, which included a race simulation
on Wednesday. The car is constantly developing, but there
is still a lot of work to do. Everyone in the team is working
really hard at the moment and I feel we are moving in the
right direction."
PEDRO DE LA ROSA
"I would say that the MP4-21 is definitely improving
at the moment, we made a step forward this week and are looking
to carry this momentum forward into the next test in Barcelona.
I had two days in the car, including the shakedown on Tuesday,
and covered over 860km."
Unofficial times*:
Pos Driver Constructor Time Laps
1 Kimi Raikkonen Team McLaren Mercedes 1m09.987 81
2 Giancarlo Fisichella Renault 1m10.921 83
3 Heikki Kovalainen Renault 1m11.071 161
4 David Coulthard Red Bull Racing 1m11.076 34
5 Pedro de la Rosa Team McLaren Mercedes 1m11.245 113
6 Adrian Sutil MF1 Racing 1m13.067 73
7 Tiago Monterio MF1 Racing 1m13.815 93
*no official times available
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