The
final day of testing at Silverstone would see a change of drivers for the
BMW WilliamsF1 team with test driver Marc Gene taking over from Ralf
Schumacher. Juan Pablo Montoya was still present. At the close of testing
Gene and Juan Pablo would be thirteenth and fourteenth respectively.
After
two difficult days in regard to the weather the third was no different as
rain continued to soak the track occasionally in the morning but despite
this a reasonable amount of dry running was achieved in the afternoon. For
both Gene and Montoya the focus was on setup work for the Canadian Grand Prix, as well
as tyre testing for Michelin.
Sam Michael, WilliamsF1 Chief Operations Engineer , said of the test: "Quite
a difficult test because of the intermittent nature of the weather, but we
still managed to progress a lot of work for Michelin, especially with regard
to compound selections for Canada, together with associated set-up work for
the forthcoming race. We also made good headway with engine development
work, so in spite of the conditions, it has been a productive test."
Ferrari's
Rubens Barrichello would again be fastest on this third day. Rubens set the
pace by far more than a second. The Ferrari team tried various set-ups for
the British Grand Prix in early July.
Allan McNish came in second and was reasonably happy: "We continued to try
and get our tyre test done and in the end we did a limited programme.
However things are shaping up well and the car was feeling good today."
Mika
Salo was also present for Toyota, but he had a troubled session, which
didn't prevent him from being optimistic: "We collected all the necessary
data and the new front and rear wing assemblies are looking good." Mika
would finish the day in fifteenth. McLaren driver Raikkonen and Coulthard
were both present with Raikkonen seventh and Coulthard eleventh.
In
third was Renault test driver Fernando Alonso. But this time he would be
seen in a Jaguar rather than his normal Renault. The engineers focused their
efforts on driver evaluation as there are no technical modifications to the
package until the British Grand Prix later on.
At Sauber, Nick Heidfeld took over from Massa. He wasn't competitive enough
and had a scary moment when he hit a bird at Bridge corner: "It just flew
straight into my helmet." Nick added: 'You'd make a change to the car and
then as soon as you went out to try it it would start to rain again.'
The
Renault drivers finished in ninth and tenth respectively. "Although the
weather has meant we haven’t done as much running as we would have liked
this week, we are nevertheless pleased with what we have achieved," said
Technical Director Mike Gascoyne. |