Formula 1

BMW Sauber happy with pre-season testing

1 Mins read

The final day of pre-season testing for BMW Sauber was disrupted by a gear box problem, which cost the team two hours of running in Barcelona.

Kamui Kobayashi was in the car for the fourth day of the Barcelona test, completing 67 laps in the C29.

Despite not managing as much mileage as he had hoped, Kobayashi feels ready for the first race of the season. “We didn't manage to achieve the expected mileage today because of technical issues. However, for me it was still agood day because we ran through several procedures for the first race weekend. As I said yesterday, these things arevery important for me and I can see I'm improving. I feel ready for Bahrain.”

Speaking in detail about the pre-season testing, technical director Willy Rampf declared the last four weeks a success for the team. “After the car ran smoothly during the earlier tests, unfortunately our final day of testing was hampered by reliability problems. In the morning it was a shifting problem, which needs to be analysed, and at the end it was a problem in the fuel system. Certainly both can be solved before Bahrain.

“In Barcelona we have been testing new aero parts, which confirmed the performance we expected after the wind tunnel tests. We also concentrated further on getting the best out of the mechanical set-ups. We have defined the Bahrain package now and feel ready for the season to kick off. The team has four very busy weeks behind it and we are very much looking forward to finally going racing. We are happy with the overall performance of the car, considering the conditions under which the lap times were achieved.”

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