By Site Staff (07/02/03)
February 7 2003

Toyota concluded another strong 4 day test at Barcelona on Wednesday, with Olivier Panis recording the 5th fastest time of the day. The team continued to work on chassis setup and tyre testing, and Olivier continues to enthuse about the new car. Olivier tested alone on 'Wednesday, with Cristiano only present for the first two days. The Frenchman completed 61 laps overall, and the car only experienced one minor problem at the end of the session.

"We had a good end to an encouraging week here in Barcelona today," Oliver said to Toyota-F1.com. "I am very happy with what I have personally achieved over two days. We almost completed our tyre programme, which has been very important. We had a mechanical problem at the end of the session today, which meant we had to stop earlier than scheduled, but the consistency and balance of the TF103 have been very good this week."

Race and Test Engineering Manager, Norbert Kreyer, was more cautious with his summary. The team had a large programme of work that they were not able to fully complete (although Norbert doesn't indicate why), but despite that the team were able to collect useful data.

"Generally, we had a large technical programme planned for this week and we managed to complete nearly all of the work we wanted to achieve," Kreyer has been quoted as saying. "Both Cristiano and Olivier had tyre testing as a priority, as we start preparing for the debut race of the season in Melbourne. Aside from that, both drivers did a lot of aerodynamic and mechanical set-up work and have given us promising feedback."

The team are now on their way back to Paul Ricard for a three day test starting next Wednesday (the 11th) with all three drivers sharing driving duties. This site hoped that the team would then move to Silvertone for the first UK test of the year which starts on Tuesday the 25th of February, but the team have confirmed that they will be in sunnier locations in Southern Spain and Italy instead.

Barcelona - 05/02/2003

1. M. Schumacher - Ferrari F2002 - 1:15.103 - 105 laps
2. R. Barrichello - Ferrari F2002 - 1:15.405 - 54 laps
3. HH. Frentzen - Sauber Petronas C22 - 1:16.336 - 111 laps
4. JP Montoya - BMW-Williams FW25 - 1:16.630 - 71 laps
5. O. Panis - Toyota TF103 - 1:16.945 - 61 laps
6. M. Gené - BMW-Williams FW24 - 1:17.234 - 74 laps
7. D. Coulthard - McLaren-Mercedes MP4/17D - 1:17.293 - 30 laps
8. K. Raikkonen - McLaren-Mercedes MP4/17D - 1:17.985 - 40 laps
9. M. Webber - Jaguar R4 - 1:18.063 - 40 laps