Day 1 Update

12.01.2009

Just a brief update on todays running.

As planned, I ran in the morning with Paul di Resta running in the afternoon. The track was cold in the early running and also quite green, so as the day wore on the track continued getting better and better on both fronts. After a brief red flag at the beginning of the session, we started into our planned testing program for the day. Without going into too much detail we ran pretty basic settings on the car to help give me a feel for the various adjustments that the car has as well as some different tire compounds. My first impressions of the car were that its just incredibly quick and capable, and its definitely different than what Im used to in its general attitude through the corner as well, so that took a bit of getting used to. After getting a few laps under my belt we got on with our program and topped the sheets more than once through the morning, ending up P3 or P4 when I actually got finished just after noon. I was a little bit frustrated with the time that I did because on that lap I ran onto the exit curb off of the final turn and lost a couple of tenths in that one spot with some wheelspin and bottoming, and also because I flat-spotted my final set of tires on the outlap which effectively destroyed them! All in all, I felt like it was good initial run in the car, and I was glad that we were able to get through so much running on schedule.

It became clear that the track continued to improve as the guys that stayed out from the morning session continued to go quicker and quicker, all of them improving their times in the afternoon. Paul got in the car and got up to speed, basically having similar comments to myself in terms of what the car was doing and what it needed to potentially do better. Right at the end of the day the times really started coming down, and he definitely made the most of it posting some really quick times just at the end, so as you can imagine I was quite anxious to look at the data and sort out where it was all coming from! Finding myself a bit further down the charts since getting out of the car, I was relieved to find that nothing was massively different, he was just able to brake a bit deeper and carry a few more miles per hour through the corner here and there. I think that I could have probably done a better job of putting a few more full laps together, but was definitely pleased to see that it looked like much of the time gained by the other guys through the day was due to the track improving. The roles are reversed for us tomorrow, so if nothing else, I certainly expect that by the time I get in the car, the grip will be quite a bit higher than when I drove it today and Ill really see what the car can do! So looking forward to getting back in!

JR