Barcelona test, day 1: Ferrari continue dominance

The majority of race drivers are still on their return journeys from Malaysia and as a result it was a full test driver turn out at the Circuit de Catalunya as the teams' relentless development schedule continues unabated.

After a weekend at Sepang that was "disappointing" by McLaren boss Ron Dennis' own volition, the Woking team was expected to throw itself into an intense testing programme in Spain this week, in an attempt to claw back the gap to its Ferrari rivals.

However race drivers Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard are not due at Barcelona until the end of the week and Wurz is charged with continuing the team's development work with a 2000-spec car.

"We are not bringing a new car here," said Wurz, "or to the test after the Brazilian Grand Prix."

Despite the lack of MP4-16, Wurz spent much of the day working on the electronics and set-up of the car and looked set to finish on top. Badoer, however, had other ideas.

The Italian experienced problems with his Ferrari F1-2000 and an engine fault put the Maranello tester into a spin causing him to stop out on the circuit just after midday. An engine change left Badoer pit-bound until just before the end of the day and with just four minutes remaining, the 29-year-old, on new tyres, went a full 0.68s faster than Wurz.

Behind the leading pair was Grand Prix veteran and Arrows development driver Johnny Herbert in third place. The three-time GP winner set his fastest time in last year's car, but also carried out some evaluation laps in the Leafield-based team's 2001 challenger.

Australian Mark Webber finished the day fourth in a Benetton B200B and continued to put more miles on the team's wide-angled Renault V10 engine. Marc Gene, the second man to have a 2001 car at his disposal, finished bottom with a time 1.67s behind Badoer, set in an FW21.

Testing continues tomorrow with an extra four teams joining the fray including Jordan, Jaguar, Prost and BAR starting on Thursday. The Brackley-based team were due to start running tomorrow, but its brace of 2001 cars from Malaysia were unfortunately left off the cargo plane in Kuala Lumpar as the load was too heavy and the BAR003s were nearest the door.


Luca Badoer, Ferrari B, 1m21.03s, 41 laps
Alex Wurz, McLaren-Mercedes B, 1m21.71s, 73 laps
Johnny Herbert, Arrows-AMT B, 1m22.32s, 76 laps
Mark Webber, Benetton-Renault M, 1m22.40s, 64 laps
Marc Gene, Williams-BMW B, 1m22.70s, 89 laps
M - Michelin
B - Bridgestone