By Jamie Makin (11/5/2004)
May 11 2004

This week team SAUBER PETRONAS will look to build on the momentum gained by improvements in the last two races by testing at the Silverstone Circuit in England. Sauber was the only team present at the track, as rival teams opted to test at different venues this week. Additional improvements to the car will be evaluated, and work will continue on car setup and tyre testing for upcoming races.

The day got off to a slow start when the circuit was shrouded in fog. It lifted late morning allowing the team to finally get to work. Felipe Massa drove chassis C23-05 for 59 laps on the full-length Grand Prix circuit. His best time of 1:19.060 was over two seconds quicker than last year's pole time set by Rubens Barrichello's Ferrari, and compares favorably with test times set by several top teams at the circuit recently.

Massa's race engineer, Mike Krack talks about the work done. "The overall purpose of this week´s test is the preparation for the forthcoming races. Today we were not able to start our work until 11.30 am due to foggy weather conditions, but despite of this loss of time we could complete our programme for today. We compared different rear wings and assessed Bridgestone front tyre constructions."

The team was working hard on making up for lost time in hopes of completing their day's programme. Some changes had to be made for the second session to see that happen. "Later we decided to run on the shorter National Circuit at Silverstone as we also planned to evaluate the tyre construction for the next race. The Grand Prix track had been too hard on this type of Bridgestone tyres and hence would have not given us the data we were looking for," explained Krack. Massa set a best time of 0:40.380 on the shorter 2.640 km long National Circuit.

At the end of the day, the team had managed to achieve their objectives, and will continue testing at the circuit tomorrow. Massa will remain at the controls until teammate Giancarlo Fisichella takes over on Thursday.

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