Formula 1

Toro Rosso Happy With Long Runs

2 Mins read

Toro Rosso managed a trouble-free day in Friday practice for this weekend’s European Grand Prix, and now look to improve the one-lap performance of their cars ahead of qualifying.

Sebastien Buemi finished the day 16th, and said afterwards that the change in track conditions throughout the day had given them something to think about. “We had a trouble free day, which is always important, so I am happy with that,” said the Swiss driver. “It was an interesting day, because between the morning and the afternoon, we saw the biggest improvement in lap time that we have had so far this season.

“That makes life quite difficult, because as the grip improved very quickly, you had to find the confidence to make use of it immediately, which is different to what we are used to. We have a reasonably good understanding of tyre behaviour after doing the long stint.

“Now we have to see where we can improve for tomorrow and overall the work we did today was not too bad.”

Jaime Alguersuari finished the day 18th and spent much of the two sessions focusing on brakes, the performance of which could well play an important part in Sunday’s race. “In the morning we did a useful test on the brakes, however, I preferred the previous system, which we went back to for the afternoon, therefore, FP1 did not mean much, but as the track conditions improved a lot for the afternoon, that was not a problem.

“In FP2, the car felt quite good and I was getting a much better feeling with the brakes, which are very important here, because on this track you can gain a lot of time through your braking.

“It was particularly good on the long runs, so I am expecting a lot from tomorrow, as we improved the car significantly from the morning to the afternoon and there is the potential to improve still more.”

Chief Engineer Laurent Mekies said that the drivers managed to complete their programmes of work today, but admits that there are still gains to be made before qualifying. “A trouble free day for both cars, which meant we were able to complete our entire work programme: it was a mix of race preparation, while also looking at qualifying,” he said.

“As always here, the grip level was very low in the morning, followed by a very significant improvement in the second session. Now we have to study all the data we have gathered in order to try and improve our single lap performance for tomorrow's qualifying.”

Click here forFree Practice 1 Times // Free Practice 2 Times

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