Driver line-up confirmed for Catalunya test

2015 F1 season

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Nine teams will participate in the two-day test at the Circuit de Catalunya which starts tomorrow, and many of them will take the opportunity to run their junior drivers.

Ferrari’s Raffaele Marcielo, Mercedes’ Pascal Wehrlein and Red Bull’s Pierre Gasly will each run on both days with two different teams. Ferrari will also give former Sauber driver Esteban Gutierrez his first run in the SF-15T.

Force India will also not run either of its two regular drivers, as Nick Yelloly will drive for them on Wednesday. Williams test driver Alex Lynn will also drive the team’s FW37 for the first time on the last day of the test.

Manor is the only team which will not participate in the first in-season test of the year.

TeamTuesday 12thWednesday 13th
MercedesNico RosbergPascal Wehrlein
Red BullDaniil KvyatPierre Gasly
WilliamsFelipe MassaAlex Lynn
FerrariRaffaele MarcielloEsteban Gutierrez
McLarenJenson ButtonOliver Turvey
Force IndiaPascal WehrleinNick Yelloly
Toro RossoPierre GaslyCarlos Sainz Jnr
LotusPastor MaldonadoJolyon Palmer
SauberMarcus EricssonRaffaele Marciello
ManorNot present

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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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11 comments on “Driver line-up confirmed for Catalunya test”

  1. Why doesn’t lewis participate In these tests?

    1. If what you meant by your question is why it is Nico instead of Hamilton, then I don’t know the answer. He probably lost on rock paper scissor to Nico. The next test will probably be Lewis turn to drive at the test.
      If what you meant by your question is why it is not Nico and Lewis, it is probably because they need at least one of their regular driver at each test to better validate what being tested. There are only 2 in-seasons testing which lasted for 2 days and there is a rule that mandate that 2 of those days being used for young driver. So right now it is Nico and Pascal. The next test would probably be Lewis and Pascal (or other young driver). That is why you see that all the teams only use 1 of their regular driver, except for Ferrari, which I don’t think Esteban is qualified as a young driver, thus… I don’t know what Ferrari is thinking.

      1. Marciello is probably considered the young driver as he has not raced a GP.

  2. I wonder why Ferrari didn’t put Kimi in the car, he was obviously not happy with the new aero parts (one of the reasons that he ran in the “old” car yesterday), this is a perfectly good chance for him to get used to the car. We wouldn’t want Kimi to dissapoint like last year just because he didn’t like the car.

    Forgive me if this is a nonsense question but the rule that states that 2 of the 4 in-season testing days must be to run young drivers, so does a reserve driver count as a “young driver”?

    1. I think he has driven a fair share of the old and new parts during the weekend to know how they work. Vettel was having issues as well so they know what to look for in the tests. I would assume they don’t have any new parts to test as well since they bolted most of them to the car in the weekend.

      Now it will be a matter of running them as much as possible and getting the setup right while ensuring that the numbers match to the wind tunnel metrics.

      I don’t think they need Kimi/Vettel for this. Also helps evaluate the youngsters performance in the current car.

      Finally, Guti’s money might have something to say about that as well.

  3. Interesting: 3 drivers driving for two different teams.

    1. They’re all racing the same engine though – Wehrlein for Mercedes, Marciello for Ferrari and Gasly for Renault.

  4. Probably have missed this, but why is manor not taking part in the test? (I assume it is cost related)

    1. @dstaplet13 They think it’s not ‘worth it’.

    2. It probably isn’t worth it. For them running the car costs lots of money and also they wouldn’t have many development parts in the stream as they have just started some signings of aerodynamicists. The Austria test should be better timing for them. Any mileage on the PU’s would cost heavily.

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