Barcelona, day 4: Fast new Ferrari
Rubens Barrichello retained the top spot in testing today (Friday) at Barcelona despite only running a handful of laps in the afternoon. The Brazilian's best time of 1m18.256s from the morning session was enough to secure his place ahead of Michael Schumacher, who covered a race distance in the new F2002. The team will announce which car it will race in Brazil tomorrow morning
Like Barrichello, Olivier Panis failed to improve his time, but the BAR driver still ended the day in third spot. The team's tester Anthony Davidson, getting extra running in the car after a back problem forced Jacques Villeneuve to sit out the test, also did a race simulation.
After two engine failures in Malaysia, McLaren's David Coulthard put more miles on the Mercedes V10s today. The Scot was reasonably pleased with the results, but is reserving judgement until the car races in Brazil.
Jaguar tested its R2 and R3 cars back-to-back. Using the R3, Pedro de la Rosa was quicker than team-mate Eddie Irvine in the 2001 car, and the team has decided to stick with the troublesome 2002 car for the foreseeable future (see separate story).
Unlike McLaren, Williams has no reliability worries, and this was illustrated by test driver Marc Gene, who covered 131 laps - or two race distances. Ralf Schumacher was also busy, and completed over 100 laps of tyre testing. In contrast, Toyota were experiencing hydraulic troubles with the TF102, which limited Mika Salo's running.
Testing continues tomorrow with the Michelin teams having the circuit to themselves in a closed-doors wet weather simulation.
Rubens Barrichello Ferrari B 1m18.256s 43
Michael Schumacher Ferrari B 1m18.747s 85
Olivier Panis BAR-Honda B 1m19.452s 74
Alex Wurz McLaren-Mercedes* M 1m19.738s 49
David Coulthard McLaren-Mercedes M 1m19.829s 52
Luca Badoer Ferrari* B 1m19.838s 26
Pedro de la Rosa Jaguar M 1m19.828s 50
Marc Gene Williams-BMW* M 1m19.871s 131
Ralf Schumacher Williams-BMW M 1m19.886s 102
Eddie Irvine Jaguar M 1m19.886s* 48
Jenson Button Renault M 1m20.081s 54
Mika Salo Toyota M 1m20.081s 54
Anthony Davidson BAR-Honda B 1m20.314s 91
Nick Heidfeld Sauber-Petronas B 1m20.416s 99
Giancarlo Fisichella Jordan-Honda B 1m21.262s 80
M = Michelin
B = Bridgestone
* denotes 2001 car
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