Barcelona Test: Summary

Posted on Thursday 12 Mar 2009 and tagged with barcelona, testing.

The AT&T Williams team concluded this week's four day test at Spain's Circuit de Catalunya this afternoon. With Nico Rosberg on duty for a second day, the team continued working on set-up enhancements for the Australian Grand Prix, which takes place in just two weekend's time. Despite heavy fog disrupting this morning's running, Nico covered good ground today recording a total of 120 laps, 558kms, and set the second quickest time of the ten-strong field with a 1:19.774.

Over the duration of the week, AT&T Williams covered 1,797kms of the Barcelona track (Nico 972.895kms and Kazuki 823.935kms), valuable mileage which will assist the team with final preparations for the opening rounds of the 2009 season.

Sam Michael, Technical Director, Williams F1:
“After an initial delay due to fog this morning, we spent our last day in Barcelona completing another useful session working mainly on the optimisation of set-up around the slick tyres, something that will be key to this year’s championship. We have made progress over the four days and now look forward to our final test in Jerez next week where we will sign off some more parts for Melbourne. The lap times are close at the moment making it difficult to predict the order - great for the sport!”

Nico Rosberg:
“We’ve put in a lot of laps this week and have definitely made good progress. Our schedule has mainly focussed on mechanical and aero testing, of which there was lots to learn because there are so many new concepts and designs this year. It’s difficult to judge where everyone is because the times are quite close, but we have one more test next week which will be an advantage.”

Kazuki Nakajima:
“It was another good test for the team. No major issues came up and the car was really consistent all week. We also completed a race simulation and did qualifying runs as well, which was good. We’ll cover any outstanding work we need to do during the one remaining pre-season test next week in Jerez and then look forward to the season actually starting!”