Ferrari F1 News

The penultimate day of testing before the Bahrain Grand Prix was covered in rain, which slowed down the programmes of the eleven teams present today at the Circuit de Catalunya near Barcelona. Just after 10:20am a consistent drizzle started to wet the track and made the work on the track in the morning quite insignificant. In the afternoon some more rain fell, but it wasn’t enough to fit the car with the wets.

Just like it had happened in Jerez, Felipe Massa, whose work programme was slightly changed, wasn’t very lucky.
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In the end there were over 21.000 spectators assisting Fernando Alonso's last day of testing and the Spanish fans' enthusiasm was altered by a good performance by the Ferrarista with a race simulation and the second fastest lap time of the day.

Alonso completed 133 laps before he had to stop on the track due to one of the common small problems, which normally happen during these winter tests. His fastest lap he drove in the morning in a time of 1.20.637, while the German Williams driver Nico Hulkenberg was 23 thousandth of a second faster in the afternoon, when there was less wind and the track in better conditions.
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Today the last test session before the 2010 Formula 1 season started in Montmelò just outside of Barcelona. Just like during the last four days in Jerez eleven cars of the thirteen teams officially enrolled went onto the Circuit de Catalunya: Campos-Meta and USF1 were missing.

Fernando Alonso started the Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro’s work programme. The Spanish driver had a slightly agitated morning – a problem with the car’s electronics let him stop on the track during the first run, therefore missing several hours of work on the track. After he went out again just before the lunch break, which is compulsory here at the track and held from 1pm to 2pm.
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The final day at Jerez would see dry running once again as Fernando Alonso at the wheel of the Ferrari F10 brought an end to this test session for Ferrari. The weather and it being a weekend would also see the grandstands a lot more busy as the Spanish public came to see their local hero in action for the Scuderia.

The testing programme today for Ferrari was once again to work on the set up of the F10,as well as completing a race distance in the afternoon, both of these were achieved as Alonso covered a total of 137 laps with a best time of 1.20.436. Ferrari have confirmed on twitter that they have yet to do any low fuel qualifying runs ...

Ferrari have recently been testing with new wheel nuts that the team hope will make pit stops quicker. With no refuelling in 2010 then the pit stops will come down to just tyre changes, in the past the tyres were always on before the fuel was finished going into the car but this year teams will be looking to shave valuable time of their stops. Ferrari have been running a cone like wheel nut that is said to decrease the time taken to change the wheels.

The wheel nut is not new on the Ferrari F10, as Ferrari has sneakily bypassed the winter testing ban by using the new wheel nuts when running the F2008 for Valentino Rossi and Felipe Massa recently at Barcelona ...

Dry weather was very much welcomed by Ferrari on Friday as they took to the Jerez circuit once again in Spain. After the previous two days had been affected by rain and high winds the sun shining was a welcome change for the team and Fernando Alonso who was at the wheel of the F10. Alonso will be running the final two days of this test as he carries on the work already completed by Felipe Massa this week.

The track was wet still in the morning but with clear skies above it was soon to dry out as Alonso and the team finally got in some dry weather running. Alonso's main task today was to once again work with the car set up and it's handling behaviour with the new Bridgestone tyres as well as vastly different fuel loads. ...