Mark Webber and Red Bull top the first day at Barcelona
Red Bull finally jumped to the top of the times in good conditions with Mark Webber in Barcelona. It will be a great boost to them to see the car at the top of the times and give them the confidence that this years car might be able to compete right at the sharp end. With Ferrari and McLaren down in 5th and 7th some two seconds off the pace though I’m not sure that much confidence can be there yet.
Sauber are still appearing in the top four runners as they have almost everywhere on everyday. It shows that they are consistent and they seem to have reliability. With their technical director Willi Rampf saying that they aren’t happy with the balance of the car and that there’s still a lot of work to do it seems that the other mid field teams are going to have another battle.
Yesterday also showed a rare failure for Ferrari with Fernando Alonso’s car stopping out on track with an electrical problem. He’ll be back in the cockpit for the second day of testing so he’ll be hoping that they can get back on it and recover any lost time.
The two new teams still sit at the bottom of the times at around six seconds of the pace, I’d expect them to improve tomorrow when they have had more of a chance to get the setup right. Virgin still need to get some real running in having only completed 31 laps because of a spin, they are still complaining about a hydraulic issue so hopefully they can get that fixed.
Times in full:
1. Mark Webber, Red Bull, 1:21.487, 109 Laps
2. Nico Hulkenberg, Williams, 1:22.407, 82 Laps
3. Nico Rosberg, Mercedes GP, 1:22.514, 107 Laps
4. Pedro de la Rosa, BMW Sauber, 1:23.144, 73 Laps
5. Jenson Button, McLaren, 1:23.452, 101 Laps
6. Vitantonio Liuzzi, Force India, 1:24.064, 65 Laps
7. Fernando Alonso, Ferrari, 1:24.170, 74 Laps
8. Vitaly Petrov, Renault, 1:24.173, 74 Laps
9. Jaime Alguersuari, Toro Rosso, 1:24.869, 111 Laps
10. Lucas di Grassi, Virgin, 1:27.057, 31 Laps
11. Fairuz Fauzy, Lotus, 1:28.002, 76 Laps
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