Difficult opening day for the ING Renault F1 Team in Bahrain
27/02/2007, Sakhir, Bahrain
Giancarlo Fisichella, R27-01, 81 laps, 434 km, fastest lap:
1'32.556
Heikki Kovalainen, R27-03, 19 laps, 102 km, fastest lap: 1'32.688
After a two-day break, the ING Renault F1 Team today resumed
work at Bahrain's Sakhir circuit, beginning its final three-day
test session of the 2007 pre-season. Representing the world
champions this week are race drivers Giancarlo Fisichella
and Heikki Kovalainen.
Giancarlo Fisichella joined the team during the weekend,
and was able to begin his programme today. The Italian focused
on completing a race distance this morning, which was eventually
completed in spite of a delay owing to a mechanical incident.
Subsequently, he focused on set-up work aimed at improving
the car balance. By the end of the day, Giancarlo had completed
81 laps, and finished sixth on the timesheets with a best
lap of 1:32.556.
On the other side of the garage, team-mate Heikki Kovalainen
endured a difficult day. After his programme was delayed by
minor technical problems during the morning, he then crashed
heavily just before lunchtime. He walked away from the accident
unhurt, but the car was severely damaged, preventing him from
running again during the afternoon. Repairs to the car are
now underway, to allow Heikki to resume his programme as soon
as possible during the day tomorrow.
Giancarlo Fisichella: "I am pleased
to be back in the car for this final test session of the winter.
It's an important session for me, because it will give us
all a good feel for things ahead of Melbourne, and allow us
to complete our final preparations. We have a lot of work
to do and today was a good start for the rest of the week."
Heikki Kovalainen: "I had a pretty
big accident today – I got caught out in turn seven
and the car hit the barriers quite hard. All the safety systems
worked perfectly so I am fine, but there is quite a lot of
damage to the car and I may not be able to start running again
until tomorrow afternoon. That will delay our programme, which
is frustrating, but the focus now is on working with the team
to get the car ready as soon as possible. Once it is, I will
be 100% concentrated on completing the rest of our work. We
are already in a good position after running for three days
last week, but there are still some important preparations
to be completed before we get to Melbourne."
Christian Silk summarised the day's testing:
"For the team, today was all about getting back in the
groove after our short break. With Giancarlo, we concentrated
on race distance work before starting to work on the set-up,
which gave some good results. Heikki's day was obviously interrupted
by the accident. We were pleased to see him walk away unharmed,
and the car did its job in protecting him. We hope he will
be able to continue with his programme tomorrow."
DRIVER TEAM BEST LAPS
1 MASSA Ferrari 1'31.260 102
2 RAIKKONEN Ferrari 1'31.590 95
3 ALONSO McLaren 1'31.851 95
4 KUBICA BMW 1'32.108 74
5 HAMILTON McLaren 1'32.193 54
6 FISICHELLA Renault 1'32.556 81
7 KOVALAINEN Renault 1'32.688 19
8 MONTAGNY Toyota 1'32.999 36
9 TRULLI Toyota 1'33.150 63
10 VETTEL BMW 1'33.219 33
11 KLIEN Honda 1'33.378 89
12 COULTHARD Red Bull Racing 1'33.526 69
13 WEBBER Red Bull Racing 1'33.540 74
14 ROSSITER Honda 1'33.597 77
15 SATO Super Aguri 1'33.813 74
16 SCHUMACHER Toyota 1'34.030 36
17 SPEED Toro Rosso 1'34.057 44
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