(Renault Sport F1)
Renault Sport F1 were part of history at the Suzuka circuit in Japan on Friday morning as they powered rookie Max Verstappen to 12th place as the the Dutch driver made his official Formula One weekend debut for the Toro Rosso team ahead of his full Formula One race debut for the Italian team in Australia next season. It was a bitter sweat session for the 17 year old who became the youngest driver in history to take part in an official session because although he finished an impressive 12th his morning was cut short due to a power unit issue.
In this morning's session there were three Renault powered cars in the top ten with Infiniti Red Bull Racing's Daniel Ricciardo in seventh place with team mate and reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel ending the session in ninth place while Toro Rosso's Daniil Kvyat rounded out the top ten.
The Lotus F1 Team's Romain Grosjean who is yet to announce his plans for next season was 15th fastest for the Enstone outfit while his team mate Pastor Maldonado was 17th respectively while the Caterham F1 Team's Marcus Ericsson was best of the 'new teams' in 19th place while Spain's Roberto Merhi who was driving in place of Kamui Kobayashi for the morning session was 20th for the Leafield outfit.
In the afternoon session Renault once again had three cars in the top ten with reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel showing strong pace in his Infiniti Red Bull Racing RB10 setting the fifth fastest time while Toro Rosso's Daniil Kvyat ended the day in 9th place while Daniel Rcciardo finished in 10th place despite bringing out the red flags following a crash in the closing stages of the session.
Jean Eric Vergne was in eleventh place in the second Toro Rosso as he continues to work on cementing a place on the Formula One grid for next season after losing his race drive with Toro Rosso to Max Verstappen for next season.
Romain Grosjean had a slight improvement in performance from this morning as the Frenchman finished the session in 13th place for the Lotus F1 Team while his team mate Pastor Maldonado finished the session in 16th place.
Marcus Ericsson finished the second session in 19th place for the Caterham F1 Team while his tem mate Kamui Koabayshi was left disappointed after crashing his Caterham in the early stages of the session. The Japanese driver ended the day at the bottom of the time sheets in 22nd place. Speaking following today's action Renault Sport F1's Head of Track Operations RemiTaffin stated:
'Today we were reminded why Suzuka is one of the hardest tracks for drivers and engineers, with several offs across the field. On a positive note, the long run pace on the Red Bull cars was strong. Obviously we were not able to complete the checks with Daniel, but over both sessions we covered 80 laps so we have enough data to optimize the pace and close the gap over one lap.
Reliability has however not been fantastic today, with issues on the Toro Rosso. Max stopped with a Power Unit problem at the end of FP1. Although this should not have happened on track, the ICE was scheduled to be changed at the end of the day, so this just accelerated our plans. When JEV took over we then had two unrelated problems with the fuel pump, which we were able fix, and then with the electronics at the end, which brought out the red flags. We will look at this overnight and ensure a smoother day overall tomorrow.
With the rain coming tomorrow and predicted to stay we will have to start from the beginning again. This does not pose any problems for us though and could be an opportunity as we know the gaps will close up between teams.'
© Ben Johnston 2014
No comments:
Post a Comment