Lotus driver Romain Grosjean continued his impressive testing form by topping the first day's running at Barcelona, ahead of Jenson Button and Sergio Perez.
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| Grosjean was fastest today |
The Lotus team had to pull out of the first test at Barcelona after serious problems for Grosjean on the opening day, but they hit back today with the French driver setting his fastest time of 1.23.252 in the last half an hour. "When you have a problem you are a little bit wondering what is going on," Grosjean said, "so we checked all day long that everything was fine - but I knew what we needed to do to repair the car and make it strong. It doesn't change much. I have exactly the same good feeling as in Jerez, we can push and we can trust the car - and you can really play with it, which is enjoyable." Grosjean's time was set on the soft tyres, which means that his time needs to be taken with a pinch of salt. Nevertheless, it is a welcome confidence booster after last week's horror show from the team. Jenson Button was second fastest for McLaren, with his best time just two tenths of a second down on Grosjean's. Furthermore, Button's time was set on the hard tyres, which bodes well for McLaren. McLaren's team manager Dave Redding said "We wanted to drill a little deeper into our understanding of the car, and that meant undertaking some bigger set-up changes that wouldn't ordinarily be available to us during a grand prix weekend."
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| Nico Rosberg did the most laps today |
Sergio Perez was third fastest for Sauber, but the Mexican brought the red flags out when he ran out of fuel while on track. Mark Webber was fourth for Red Bull, and spent the majority of the early day doing long runs, before setting his personal best time of 1.23.830 on the medium tyres later on. The Australian, who has finished third in the last two seasons, stated he was happy with his team's work so far, and predicted a tight championship this year. "It is going to be really tight, the racing will be between several teams for sure, and it is difficult to understand who is doing what at the moment because we have such a big variation in fuel and tyre conditions and all sorts of stuff." Nico Rosberg was fifth fastest in the Mercedes W03, and was once again the driver with most laps, the German completing 128 tours. Jean-Eric Vergne was sixth in the Toro Rosso, while Force India's Paul di Resta was seventh. Felipe Massa continued Ferrari's difficult testing period, with the Italian team still struggling to understand the F2012. Vitaly Petrov ended the day ninth for Caterham, after taking over from Heikki Kovalainen, who is suffering from food poisoning. He is expected to return this week though. Pastor Maldonado was slowest in the Williams, and drove just 58 laps.
Pos. | Driver | Team | Time |
1 | Romain Grosjean | Lotus | 1.23.252 |
2 | Jenson Button | McLaren | 1.23.510 |
3 | Sergio Perez | Sauber | 1.23.820 |
4 | Mark Webber | Red Bull | 1.23.830 |
5 | Nico Rosberg | Mercedes | 1.23.992 |
6 | Jean-Eric Vergne | Toro Rosso | 1.24.216 |
7 | Paul di Resta | Force India | 1.24.305 |
8 | Felipe Massa | Ferrari | 1.24.318 |
9 | Vitaly Petrov | Caterham | 1.24.876 |
10 | Pastor Maldonado | Williams | 1.25.587 |
Keep with my blog for all the opinions, launches and testing updates throughout the winter, as we count down to the Australian Grand Prix.
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