Red Bull Barcelona Day One Report
By Ian Lockwood
March 10 2009
Every Formula One team entered in the 2009 World Championship is present here at the Catalunya Circuit, near Barcelona, for the final dress rehearsal in the form of a four day test, the last official session prior to the Australian Grand Prix.
Recent tests in Spain have been blighted by bad weather, but apart from a few worrying drops in the early morning, sunshine has been the order of the day. Red Bull Racing is here with another new chassis, number 3, so the first item on today's agenda was a shakedown, which went off according to plan.
Once that was completed, it was back to general car development work prior to the season opener in Melbourne, evaluating various new aero and mechanical components. At the same time, Mark Webber ran a comparison between the Bridgestone "medium" and "soft" tyres. By the end of the day, the car had also completed enough laps to sign off a durability check on the Renault engine, which had been carried over from last week's Jerez test.
Mark Webber continues driving tomorrow, before handing over to Sebastian Vettel for the final two days.
Driver: Mark Webber
Car: RB5 – 03
Laps: 117
Best time: 1:22.246
Circuit length: 4.655 km Fastest lap: N. Heidfeld – 1:20.338