Jerez Testing, Day 1,
The ING Renault F1 Team resumes its winter testing
programme in Jerez
Nelson Piquet R28-02, 120 laps, 526 km, fastest lap: 1'19.660
Lucas Di Grassi R28-01, 92 laps, 404 km, fastest lap: 1'21.200
The ING Renault F1 Team returned to action today, completing
the first of three days in Jerez. With the opening Grand Prix
in Melbourne just over a month away, the team is entering
the busiest phase in its winter testing programme with three
tests planned for the next three weeks.
Warm and sunny conditions greeted the team this morning and
remained throughout the day, allowing the team to complete
a full day's running with few interruptions. The team was
again running two R28s with Nelson Piquet joined by fellow
Brazilian, Lucas Di Grassi, who was enjoying his first test
with the new car.
The programme for Nelson involved basic set-up work this
morning as the team continues to improve the car's balance.
He then carried out some long runs later in the day and showed
good consistency. Lucas spent the morning carrying out some
performance tests as he familiarised himself with the new
car before he too completed some longer runs. It was the chance
to add further miles to the car, which again showed good reliability.
By the end of the day, Nelson had covered 120 laps, clocking
a best lap of 1'19.660. Lucas completed 92 laps with a best
lap of 1'21.200.
Nelson Piquet: "Another good day and
lots of mileage for the car and myself. The more I drive the
car, the happier I feel and it's all good preparation for
the first race. The car ran well today and we did not have
any problems, which meant we could do a race distance in the
afternoon."
Lucas Di Grassi: " It's my first time
driving a Formula 1 car on a proper track, and for sure the
car feels really good and it was a really impressive experience.
I'm really happy with my day, we did a lot of laps, the pace
was consistent, and I felt comfortable with the team and the
car. We did one long run in the afternoon which went well,
and I'm looking forward to working with the team later this
week. "
Christian Silk, Chief Test Engineer: "The
two main objectives of the programme were to complete a race
distance with Nelson and to get Lucas comfortable in the car
as he had not run an R28 on a full circuit test before. Both
these were completed without any problems and both cars enjoyed
a trouble-free day. Nelson did a bit of performance work in
the morning, improving the set-up of the car, and completed
a race distance in the afternoon without any major issue,
so that was a good day for us."
DRIVER - TEAM - BEST LAPS
1 HAMILTON McLaren 1'19.102 89
2 DE LA ROSA McLaren 1'19.287 88
3 KUBICA BMW 1'19.539 91
4 NAKAJIMA Williams 1'19.601 93
5 PIQUET ING Renault F1 Team 1'19.660 120
6 HEIDFELD BMW 1'19.958 94
7 WEBBER Red Bull Racing 1'20.013 113
8 ROSBERG Williams 1'20.029 125
9 VETTEL Toro Rosso 1'20.105 53
10 COULTHARD Red Bull Racing 1'20.176 111
11 BOURDAIS Toro Rosso 1'20.418 82
12 BARRICHELLO Honda 1'21.133 71
13 DI GRASSI ING Renault F1 Team 1'21.200 92
14 SATO Super Aguri 1'21.400 90
15 LIUZZI Force India 1'21.553 103
16 WURZ Honda 1'21.950 86
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