Official 2008/2009 Winter Testing Thread

Gotta say, from the front these cars look like they mean business :). Nice to see some proper fat skid marks too :p
 
  • Andy Marsden

Who needs drugs when you can have the roar of an F1 engine!
I'm seriously looking forward to the new season, the new cars do look the business and they seem more planted (on track stability)than last years.
 
  • Andy Marsden

Bahrain Day One - Glock on top

Looks like Toyota are coming on in leaps and bounds once again. First day of pre-season testing at Bahrain for Ferrari, BMW and Toyota and the boys from Japan are on top courtesy of Glock.
I sense that 2009 could be a VERY interesting season!
Visit the Official F1 Website here for the full story.
 
Wow..as you said an exciting season awaits us. The lap times are very close... :) ....But as it's Kubica's first warm weather experince with this car, his 3rd place is natural.
 
Today:
Massa 1:33.639
Kubica 1:34.398
Glock 1:34.902
They didn't finish the entire session though because of weather! And Glock's time he ran yesterday is still better, Massa ran about the same.

Yesterday Jerez results are also interesting:
Buemi (2008 car) 1:19.660
Vettel 1:22.177
Hülkenberg (Williams) 1:22.443
Kovalainen 1:22.634
Piquet 1:23.313
 
Hamilton Quickest Of 2009-Spec Cars

Jerez: Bourdais leads the way


Seb Bourdais marked his first outing as a confirmed 2009 Toro Rosso race driver with a fastest lap time at Jerez on Thursday.

Only last Friday was Bourdais confirmed for this year's Championship, taking the final available seat on the 2009 grid.

Less than a week later and the Frenchman was back in action for Toro Rosso, safe in the knowledge that his F1 career had been handed a lifeline.

And he once again proved his speed to the team, clocking a 1:18.493 to take the P1 slot on the fourth day of testing.

Meanwhile Lewis Hamilton may have been second overall, however, the McLaren driver was the quickest of those using their 2009-spec cars.

Completing 93 laps in his MP4-24, the reigning F1 World Champ posted a best time of 1:20.737.

"Today's test gave me the first opportunity to drive MP4-24 in warm, dry conditions - and I'm very encouraged by what I felt," he said.

"The car feels strong, very similar to last year's car, in fact. It doesn't take long to get used to the new buttons in the cockpit but the real test for everyone now is to understand the slick tyres ahead of the first race in Melbourne next month."

Seb Vettel, taking over from Mark Webber for the day, was third quickest, however, he was sidelined for part of the day due to some bodywork damage to his RB5 that took a couple of hours to fix.

Williams' Kazuki Nakajima was fourth quickest while once again it was a Renault bringing up the rear.

Fernando Alonso was fifth quickest, finishing half a second off Hamilton's pace. "Today was all about getting mileage on the car, especially with the new KERS system," said Alonso.

"It was my first full dry day in the car and so I was able to learn a lot. We completed lots of laps, which is encouraging and now we will start working on the set-up of the car so that I can get more comfortable with it."



Code:
[B]Times[/B]
1  S. Bourdais Scuderia Toro Rosso  01:18.493 126 laps
2  L. Hamilton McLaren  01:20.737 93 laps
3  S. Vettel Red Bull  01:20.738 92 laps
4  K. Nakajima Williams  01:20.898 92 laps
5  F. Alonso Renault  01:21.307 133 laps
 
Seems it's not going well for McLaren... First I thought they're ok, because Kovalainen was fast yesterday, but now I see they don't use the new rear wing... Hamilton has beaten Vettel with 0,001s today, but Red Bull uses the new wing...
Interesting:)
The most beautiful from these cars are also the Red Bulls!:)
 
All wintertest threads have been merged into one, to keep the discussion going :)

Regarding posting images, please make sure you use a space between them when you post, i have edited this thread multiple times now because the forum was way to wide :)
 
Finally some good times from Renault. I saw McLaren was still running with the '08 rear wing so no real clue on how fast the car really was today.

Can't wait 'till Melbourne :eat:

Edit: Just saw that Williams are running with a new, higher and smaller, nose cone.
 
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