SPANISH GRAND PRIX PREVIEW
Formula One’s European season opens this weekend with
the 37th Spanish Grand Prix at the Circuit de Catalunya, located
to the north of Barcelona in Montmeló. Hosting the
race for the 17th time, Catalunya is a favoured testing venue
among the teams, and is a well known entity to the drivers
who have all banked considerable mileage at the track over
the winter.
Following its return from Bahrain, the AT&T Williams
team and its drivers, Nico Rosberg and Kazuki Nakajima, have
spent four days testing aero and mechanical updates at Barcelona
and is well prepared for making the short journey to Spain
again this week for round four of the FIA Formula One World
Championship.
Once the Williams-Toyota FW30s complete 26 laps of the Spanish
Grand Prix, the team will celebrate the first of a series
of landmarks this year having recorded 50,000 raced laps in
Formula One since Williams Grand Prix Engineering’s
debut race in Argentina in 1978.
Nico Rosberg
I’m looking forward to this weekend’s Spanish
Grand Prix because we know the circuit well as we’ve
done a lot of testing there in the past. The car performed
well at Catalunya throughout winter testing, so it should
run well in the race. We had a promising test there last week;
I had two day’s preparation time with the car which
should stand us in good stead for the race. The only difficulty
with Barcelona is that track conditions are constantly changing
so you’re frequently having to adjust your set-up. Malaysia
is now firmly behind us and I’m hoping we’ll come
away from next weekend with a positive result.
Kazuki Nakajima
We have some aero updates on the car for Barcelona, which
we spent last week testing, and they should bring us some
gains performance-wise. Personally, I like the Circuit de
Catalunya. I had a good result there when I raced in GP2 last
year and I hope I can do well in my debut Spanish Grand Prix.
My engineer, Xevi Pujolar, is from Spain, so it’s technically
going to be one of our home races, so I’m hoping I can
get him a good result!
Sam Michael, Technical Director, Williams F1
Barcelona is a great test of aerodynamic efficiency, engine
power and chassis balance. It tends to highlight a car’s
strengths and weaknesses, except perhaps the brakes because
braking loads in Barcelona are fairly minimal compared to
other tracks because there are numerous high speed corners
with high lateral corner loads on entry and exit. We have
tested at Barcelona throughout the winter, and as recently
as last week, during which time we’ve fine tuned set-up
and brought some aerodynamic and mechanical developments to
the car. Bridgestone will bring two tyres from the harder
end of the compound range for this race and strategy tends
to lean towards two stops because the high speed corners make
a one stop option too difficult.
With the cars demonstrating good reliability now, our target
for Barcelona is to continue improving our performance and
getting points in order to build upon our position in the
Constructors’ Championship, but it will be a tough battle.
Circuit de Catalunya, Barcelona
Regarded as one of the most technically challenging circuits
on the calendar, it is perhaps fortunate that the teams spend
the majority of their allocated test days collecting valuable
data at Montmeló ahead of the race. Unfortunately,
however, track and weather conditions are invariably disparate
between testing and the Grand Prix weekend leaving the drivers
and their engineers with a relatively green track to contend
with from the outset.
Barcelona is a high speed, high downforce circuit, with fast,
sweeping corners connected by even faster straights and will
see the drivers reach speeds of 305kph along the start/finish
straight and fly into corners such as Seat at 240kph. The
engines will spend each lap of the 66 lap race at 57% full
throttle, so top end speeds are important, most crucially
on the start/finish straight which will see the drivers flat
out for over a kilometre.
Barcelona’s erratic weather conditions, particularly
the prevailing winds, can de-stabilise the car’s aero
balance, so the teams are continually chasing the perfect
set-up. With so many variables, the outcome of the Spanish
Grand Prix should never be predicted.
STATS & FACTS
KEY RACE DATA
RACE DISTANCE / LAPS 4.655kms / 2.892 miles. 66 laps = 307.104kms
/ 190.834 miles
RACE START TIME Local: 14.00, BST: 13.00
2007 FASTEST LAP F Massa, Ferrari: 1:22.680
2007 POLE SITTER F Massa, Ferrari: 1:21.421
2007 RACE WINNER F Massa, Ferrari
PIT-STOP SCHEDULE
1 stop: Laps 28 - 32
2 stops: Laps 19 – 26, 39 - 47
3 stops: Laps 16 – 19, 30 – 36, 44 - 50
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