2009 F1 testing: March 1st (Pictures)

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Giancarlo Fisichella put more laps on the VJM02 at Jerez

Today saw all eight of the 2009-specification F1 cars launched so far on track together for the first time at Jerez in Spain.

Sebastian Vettel was comfortably fastest in the Red Bull, over 1.3s quicker than Felipe Massa’s Ferrari.

Times from today’s test

Here are the best times from the test (thanks to Striay for posting these elsewhere).

Sebastian Vettel, Red Bull – 1.19:055 87 laps
Felipe Massa, Ferrari – 1.20:330 63 laps
Kamui Kobayashi, Toyota – 1.20:699 79 laps
Nico Rosberg, Williams – 1.21:171 71 laps
Robert Kubica, BMW – 1.21:292 47 laps
Giancarlo Fisichella, Force India – 1.21:584 31 laps
Pedro De la Rosa, McLaren – 1.21:831 94 laps
Nelson Piquet Jnr, Renault – 1.22:011 52 laps

Pictures from today’s test

Images (C) Force India F1 Team, BMW ag

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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24 comments on “2009 F1 testing: March 1st (Pictures)”

  1. StrFerrari4Ever
    1st March 2009, 17:51

    i know its early days but red bull are looking very competetive hopefully str will be competetive when they receive the new car :)

  2. Here’s Ferrari’s press release:

    Circuit: Jerez circuit – 4.423 km
    Driver: Felipe Massa
    Car: Ferrari F60
    Weather: air temperature 15/18 °C, track temperature 15/19 °C. From cloudy to overcast, with a few drops of rain in the afternoon and bursts of sunshine at the end of the day.

    First of five days of testing this week for Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro, working at the Jerez de la Frontera circuit, in southern Spain.

    Felipe Massa gave the Ferrari F60 its debut at this track. The Brazilian driver worked on finding the best set-up on the car and on reliability testing. By the end of the day, Felipe had covered 63 laps, the quickest in a time of 1.20.330. The work schedule was interrupted by several red flag stoppages, as well as a long break, shortly after midday, following an off-track excursion, although the car was not damaged.

    Testing at this track continues tomorrow, again with Massa on track.

  3. It seems the Force India isn’t too far off the pace of the front runners considering it was only launched today or yesterday. Although i know off season testing isn’t anything normally compared with race speed.

  4. Andrew White
    1st March 2009, 18:13

    What hasn’t been mentioned here is that BMW and McLaren were ‘evaluating 2010 tyre designs for Bridgstone’, rather than solely testing their own machines.

    Also, I would wait until Melbourne before tipping the RB5 to compete with the front runners. The late launch and more unique design will limit the scope to improve compared to other teams.

    But still, 1.3s quicker than anyone else? They must be doing something right :)

  5. Press release from BMW:

    Day one – Sunday
    Weather conditions: Overcast all day, light rain in the afternoon.
    Temperature: Air: 15 – 18 °C, Track: 14 – 19 °C Number of drivers participating: 8 from 8 teams
    Fastest lap overall: Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull Racing) 1:19.055 min
    Circuit length: 4.428 km

    Robert Kubica
    Chassis / engine: BMW Sauber F1.09-03 / BMW 86/9 Test kilometres today: 209 (47 laps)
    Fastest lap: 1:21.292 min

    Programme: For the BMW Sauber F1 Team the main focus of today’s programme was to test the 2010 specification tyres. The goal was to give the Bridgestone engineers feedback on next year’s compounds. Robert Kubica was at the wheel for the first of five days of testing in Jerez. In the morning the team decided to make a precautionary engine change after sensors indicated there was a problem. It then began to drizzle just as Kubica resumed testing. As several parts of the track were wet, the team switched from tyre testing to race start simulations. “Unfortunately I couldn’t drive as many laps as planned. In the afternoon the session was interrupted by five red flags and the changing weather”, Robert Kubica said after completing 47 laps. “Because of this I expect a very busy day tomorrow.”

    What comes next: The BMW Sauber F1 Team will be testing in Jerez until Thursday. Tomorrow and on Tuesday Robert Kubica will be on duty, while for the last two days Nick Heidfeld will take over the BMW Sauber F1.09.

  6. I can’t help but think that the renault engine may now be slightly more powerful than the others leading to the RB5 being so fast (which makes the lack of pace in their own car even more amusing/worrying).

  7. I was following testing all day today and have attended the last tests, and i cant help but think that the RB5 is quicker than the others, when i saw them live it was very clear the RB5 was faster than any of them. Not to add the fact that Renault were EXTREMELY slow with Alonso on board.

    Thanks for the mentioning Keith, i was really happy when i saw it :) lol!

    Oh and Keith, on weds i shall be attending these tests and might take some photos so if you want them just post me a reply or send me an email!

    P:S: Anyone knows how to get into the paddock at Jerez?

    1. hi sergio
      how are you???
      are you stil ill???
      =]

  8. Haven’t really noticed before with the ’09 cars but the profile view of the Force India shows that the drivers legs must be inclined to get to the pedals?
    Anyone know of a cut-away shot that shows the driver in situ?

  9. After looking at others the inclination is certainly more pronounced with the Force India.

  10. Some nice pictures but I’m curious why Ferrari seem to hide some of their sponsorships almost under the curve of the exhaust going under the car at the back of the car…

    1. The rest of the car is ”owned” by Philip Morris and you have to pay them to get in their part of the car. Renault has sds down there too…

  11. The RBR does seems to be fast but they did their best time on a 2 lap stint while the others were doing long runs, so it is a bit hard to say. Ferrari were able to consistently do stints in the 1:20 region right from the start of testing early in the morning, that seemed to be impressive considering that they weren’t testing at Jerez like some of the others, Toyota were also doing some impressive longer runs.

    1. The RBR does seems to be fast but they did their best time on a 2 lap stint while the others were doing long runs, so it is a bit hard to say.

      Ah that’s quite telling.

      I’m surprised people are trying out the 2010 tyres already as well.

    2. Mouse_Nightshirt
      2nd March 2009, 2:08

      I’m not too surprised Keith – when else will they be able to test it once the season has started?

  12. Renault press release:

    ING Renault F1 Team and Nelson Piquet begin testing in Jerez

    Nelson Piquet, R29-03, 52 laps, 230 km, fastest lap 1:22.011

    The ING Renault F1 Team was back in action today to begin the first of four days testing at the Jerez circuit in the south of Spain.

    The team’s Brazilian race driver, Nelson Piquet, was behind the wheel of the R29 as the team continued with its development programme. Conditions were cool and overcast with a light rain shower hitting the circuit after lunch, but overall the track remained dry for most of the day.

    Despite losing track time with some technical issues, Nelson began evaluating new development items and worked on various set-up options, completing a total of 52 laps by the end of the day.

    Nelson remains in the car for a second day of work tomorrow before Fernando joins the team for Tuesday and Wednesday.

    Nelson Piquet: “We had a few issues with the car today which limited our mileage, but we still managed to evaluate some of the new parts we brought to this test. The track was improving throughout the day as we had a lot of cars running and so it should get better and better throughout the week. Looking ahead to tomorrow, the priority is to get more miles under our belt – the weather should be similar so hopefully we will get another dry day.”

    Christian Silk, Chief Test Engineer: “It was quite a difficult day with limited mileage due to some small problems that we had on the car. As a result we didn’t get as much set-up work done as we would have liked, but the engineers still have some interesting data that they will go through this evening. The priority for the rest of the week is to continue adding mileage to the car and continuing with our set-up work.”

  13. McLaren press release:

    Pedro joined the test team today to evaluate compounds and casings for Bridgestone’s 2010-spec rubber. Next year’s tyres will be different as they will no longer be pre-heated in blankets and must also sustain cars running with heavier fuel-loads due to the ban on refuelling. While the team conducted some work using blankets, the prime runs were done without pre-heating, providing Bridgestone with useful data for next season. Despite the day’s session being punctuated by several red flags, the team completed 94 laps before an oil pressure sensor brought Pedro to a premature halt out on the circuit with just 10 minutes of the session remaining. Pedro said: “Running without tyre blankets makes it harder to get heat into the tyre – but that’s the objective for next year and that’s why Bridgestone will supply the teams with different compounds. We managed a lot of laps today and the work with the tyres was very positive.”

  14. Force India press release:

    VJM02 completes first day of testing

    1 March 2009 – The Force India Formula One Team today completed its first full test day of the 2009 season. Giancarlo Fisichella gave the VJM02 its initial laps at the Jerez de la Frontera circuit in southern Spain, recording a promising sixth quickest time of the eight-man field, a 1:21.584.

    Given the relatively late debut of the car, today’s programme was designed to give as much running as possible, complete systems checks and accumulate the maximum possible amount of data going into the start of the season.

    Although the predicted rain stayed away for the majority of the session, the day was not without interruption following frequent red flag periods. The VJM02 also experienced some downtime when an issue with the fuel system developed following initial runs. Giancarlo was however able to complete 31 laps and was encouraged by the improved performance of the 2009 challenger.

    Giancarlo will continue testing duties tomorrow before Adrian Sutil takes over on Tuesday 2 March.

    Giancarlo Fisichella

    It is a bit frustrating as we could only do 31 laps today, especially as it is very important to try and get as many as possible as we are already late compared to the other teams. I’m am however quite surprised and happy about what I felt with the behaviour of the car today. It’s very promising and I felt much more consistency, even under braking, and more stability in the high speed corners. We need to improve the traction a bit and also the oversteering after a few laps, but this is a problem others have had as well. The lap time is good and I am quite pleased as we did it with one set of new tyres and I know I can do much better than this. We are not that far away from the other people so I am looking forward to tomorrow and another day with more laps where we can try to improve the car a little bit and concentrate on reliability.

    James Key, technical director

    Thanks to McLaren, Mercedes and all the guys back at the factory for all their hard work in getting the car ready for this test. Given the timeframe we’ve had, to get laps in here is a major achievement. It was certainly good to be running today for the first time at a test following our shakedown last week. The rain didn’t come today as much as expected so we got more time than we thought, although it was difficult to get a clear run with the numerous red flags. We also had one simple issue that halted our running, a fuel system problem. We don’t feel it is fundamental, we just need to get to the bottom of fixing it. Other than this, the car ran very well and behaved as expected. We got a lot of good feedback from Giancarlo and his feel for what the car is doing within its parameters. We will do more running tomorrow, as we need to run through some more baseline set-up as we could only do one set up change here today.

    Testing data

    Driver
    Giancarlo Fisichella

    Track
    Jerez de la Frontera, Spain

    Best lap time
    1 min 21.584

    Laps completed – 31

    KM’s completed – 137 km

    Air temperature – High of 16C

    Track temperature – High of 16C

    Weather condition – Mainly overcast, some rain showers with sunny periods

  15. Toyota lagging behind the rest… in terms of issuing their press release:

    Panasonic Toyota Racing today returned to the track for the start of five days of testing in Jerez, Spain. The weather forecast is changeable for the week ahead but the skies were largely kind to the eight teams in action on day one. The morning was cloudy but dry and despite a shower early in the afternoon the cars were able to run without major disruption. Kamui Kobayashi was at the wheel of the TF109, going through a programme of aerodynamic evaluations. He will hand over to Timo Glock as the test continues tomorrow.

    Kamui Kobayashi – Chassis TF109-03

    Best lap time: 1min 20.699s
    Position: 3rd out of 8
    Total laps: 79

    “This morning was my first real chance to try out the TF109 in dry conditions. From the first run the car felt easy to drive so we were able to get straight into our programme of aero work. It certainly feels like a step forward from last year. The shower interrupted our afternoon but we still made it through our programme. Overall it went well so this was a good day of testing for us.”

    Pascal Vasselon – Senior General Manager Chassis

    “Today we have had very different conditions compared to what we experienced at our last test in Bahrain. Now we are back in a typical European winter. This cooler weather leads to tyre graining, which means we have had to monitor the tyre situation carefully in order to be able to draw conclusions. We have also had to manage the weather conditions but Kamui has completed some useful aerodynamic work and we’ve had a trouble-free day.”

  16. Kobayashi seems to have put in a decent lap time eh?

    I’m trying not to bother with preseason testing, I’ll just wait for the surprises come Melbourne, Barcelona even moreso.

    Having said that, the Renault’s pace is worrying, hopefully they’ll get whatever it is thats holding the back out of the way. Alonso seems to be pretty upbeat, but the lap times are suggesting otherwise.

    Does anybody know anything that I don’t?

  17. Okay so these 09 spec cars look waaaaay better in action than the studio pics of them did, still does anyone else think the Ferrari is now the ugliest of the lot..?? Yep I even prefer the Renault to the Ferrari…

  18. Renault seem to have gone the opposite way to the other teams, in terms of having a much fatter nose compared with the Red Bull (penned by A Newey) and the Ferrari, which is also near the top of the testing sheets.

    They also have PKJr in the cockpit, which won’t have helped much.

  19. Williams’ press release:

    After a two week break, the team were back on track this week for the second of three pre-season Jerez tests. The five day test will afford Nico Rosberg three days and team mate Kazuki Nakajima two days behind the wheel of the all new Williams-Toyota FW31.

    In preparation for the season opener in Melbourne at the end of this month, the team will spend the week testing the Melbourne aero package and Bridgestone’s slick tyres, both drivers will also work through systems and reliability checks and complete a race simulation.

    The opening day of the test saw seven other teams out on track, of which AT&T Williams secured the fourth quickest time of the session with Nico’s 1:21.171 and cover over 310kms.

    Nico Rosberg will resume testing responsibilities on Monday.

  20. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omlX6ljuDKo

    The link is some Spanish video from the test.

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