The first day of the pre-season test was held at the Circuit de Catalunya in Barcelona on Monday with the three hour morning session taking place under overcast skies but fortunately it wasn’t raining although the track was damp. The first hour saw most of the teams running installation laps and getting the drivers comfortable in their cars before starting to run faster laps as the track began to dry and the work began to develop the cars for the new season. As the session entered its second hour the cars began to reduce their times but the two racing Engineering drivers, Louis Delétraz and Gustav Malja concentrated on their car set-ups and made no effort to set any quick times and at the end of the three hours Gustav had a best time of 1:30.365 after sixteen laps with Louis on 1:31.591 who completed seventeen laps.
As the afternoon session got underway the drivers were greeted by the sun and warmer temperatures. Both Racing Engineering cars were running well and the drivers were soon setting competitive times with Gustav lying 3rd on 1:29.760 after ninety minutes and Louis was right behind in 7th on 1:30.623. With thirty minutes remaining Louis improved to 1:29.699 for 4th fastest and as the session came to an end Gustav leapfrogged his teammate to finish 4th on 1:29.230.
It was sunny but not especially warm on Tuesday as the morning session got underway at 09:00 and both Racing Engineering drivers were again running well as lap times started to fall but both men were once again concentrating on their car setups. The session was briefly interrupted by a red flag after two hours but the cars were soon back on track. As the session reached the final hour Gustav began to push and he set his fastest lap so far with a time of 1:28.620 for sixth place and Louis was just a fraction slower in 11th with a time of 1:28.887. With thirty minutes to go Gustav stopped out on the track bringing out a red flag and in the remaining time Louis didn’t improve on his earlier lap and Gustav had his times from the session disallowed due to a technical infringement.
Once again it was sunny for the afternoon session and it was warmer as most of the teams looked to carry out race simulations. Neither Louis or Gustav went for fast times and with an hour to run Louis had a fastest lap of 1:33.864 with Gustav on 1:33.901, the young Swede improved in the final sixty minutes reducing his lap time to 1:32.932 while his Swiss teammate didn’t improve.
The final day of testing, Wednesday, saw the weather continue to be warm and sunny and all the FIA F2 Championship teams were looking to take advantage of the ideal conditions and get in plenty of laps. The start of the session saw three brief red flag periods but the lap times were soon falling and after an hour Gustav was 4th fastest with a lap of 1:28.837 with Louis in 8th on 1:29.432 and in the following sixty minutes Louis reduced his time to 1:28.881, his fastest time of the three days. In the final one hour neither driver improved as they concentrated on long runs.
The final session of the three days saw the teams running race simulations and practising pitstops so nobody was trying for any quick lap times and Louis and Gustav finished the session very closely matched in 10th and 11th with times of 1:33.123 and 1:33.293 respectively.
During the three days of testing both of the Racing Engineering drivers showed promising pace and that both Louis and Gustav will be amongst the front runners for the 2017 FIA F2 Championship. The teams will now prepare for the second, and final, pre-season testing which will take place at the Sakhir Circuit, Bahrain on the 29-30-31 March. |
|
Team Comments:
Sebastien Viger, Technical Director: “It was an intense 3 days of test in Barcelona, where we tackled the new FIA F2 Championship era. Both drivers are new for this year and we spent time trying some technical solutions and procedures in order to extract the best possible as early as the first race of the season. We covered the majority of our test plan, which is always a good sign, and now there is a lot of data to analyse within a week, and detect what worked and what didn’t. Both drivers had a really good race simulations which is always encouraging with new drivers, and a lot of solutions were tried. There is still some room for improvement in the short runs and we will work hard to unlock more potential in the next Bahrain test, especially as we already saw that the field will be extremely close this year.”
Louis Delétraz: “The first FIA Formula 2 Championship test of the year in Barcelona was positive. It was great to get back in a car after a three-month winter break! Overall, I am pleased with how the test went, there was a lot of positive and some negatives, we learnt a lot and will make sure to fix everything for the Bahrain Test in 2 weeks. During the three days test we worked on Performance and Race Simulation, Start Practice, Pit Stop Practice etc. Next stop is Bahrain for another three days testing, can’t wait.”
Gustav Malja:: “First, it's great to finally be back in the car again. It's been a very long break since last year's finale in Abu Dhabi, but it all came back very quickly once I got out on track here in Barcelona, which was positive. We have had a good, productive test, focussing on our own targets and trying to slowly but surely optimise the set-up of the car for different parts of the race weekend. It's all been smooth and I think we've got a solid base to build on for the next test.” |
|
