Spanish GP, Friday,
The Renault F1 Team today completed a trouble-free opening
day of practice at Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya, ahead
of Sunday's Spanish Grand Prix.
Already in 2006, the trend has been for each team's race
drivers to run relatively little on Friday in order to economise
engine mileage. At a circuit such as Barcelona, where every
team completes thousands of kilometres of testing mileage
during the winter, this was even more the case. At Renault,
the objective was to evaluate the two types of Michelin tyre
available this weekend, as Barcelona is a particularly hard
circuit for the tyres owing to the numerous high-speed corners
in its layout. This was completed without any particular problems,
and the team will now set to work analysing the results of
the tests in order to make the best choice for tomorrow's
qualifying session but, most importantly, Sunday's race.
Fernando Alonso, P3, 18 laps total, 1:16.860
It was fantastic to start running today in Barcelona. After
months of testing here with empty grandstands, I think all
the drivers will have enjoyed driving in front of some spectators,
not just me! But I don't think that the Friday at any other
circuit has the same level of emotion as we saw from the fans
today, it was wonderful to see them all around the circuit.
In terms of our programme, it was all OK. We checked the tyres
and didn't have any big problems, because the results were
quite similar to the test. I am looking forward to qualifying
and the race, and I hope I can give the fans something to
enjoy!
Giancarlo Fisichella, P7, 19 laps total, 1:17.291
Today wasn't perfect for us and I think we still have quite
a lot of room for improvement. At the moment, the car does
not feel fantastic. Compared to the test, the track is very
slippery and the grip is quite low. The balance of the car
was pretty good, but we need to improve the grip level of
the car for tomorrow.
Pat Symonds, Executive Director of Engineering
We took a slightly different approach to our programme today.
Barcelona may be a circuit at which we conduct a significant
proportion of our testing programme, but it is also a track
at which tyre choice is critical. This is because of the circuit's
severity on the tyres, as there are many long, high-speed
corners. We therefore completed some longer runs this afternoon
to assess the tyre performance, and we are very pleased with
the results.
Denis Chevrier, Head of Trackside Engine Operations
This is a circuit which changes a lot during the day, and
this morning's rain shower added a further unknown factor
to the mix before we began running. Indeed, this was primarily
a day for assessing and fine-tuning chassis performance. From
an engine point of view, Barcelona is a circuit we know very
well, and at which we have already tested with the B-specification
engine. As such, we ran through our normal checks on Fernando's
race-old engine, and Giancarlo's new one. Everything ran smoothly
and we collected plenty of useful data
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