Renault Duo Dominant at Imola - Day One

The Renault Formula One team dominated the first day of this week's testing at the Imola circuit, where three teams kicked off their programmes.

Spaniard Fernando Alonso and teammate Jarno Trulli finished on top of the times as the French squad continued to impress with their new R24 chassis. Alonso posted a quickest time of 1:20.493, almost three tenths quicker than Trulli, who was the busiest man on track with 84 laps.

"A pleasing first day at Imola: in spite of the slightly shorter running hours at this circuit, we have completed a total 800km today with the two cars and made good progress with our programme," said Renault's Pat Symonds.

"We experienced no reliability problems, and both drivers are reporting the new car to be a good improvement over the kerbs relative to its predecessor. All in all, a very satisfying day of testing."

The Sauber team also started a three-day test with both Felipe Massa and Giancarlo Fisichella working with the Petronas-powered C23s. Brazilian Massa was the quickest of the two, outpacing Italian Fisichella by over three tenths of a second.

"Since Imola has similar characteristics as Melbourne we did some set-up work on both cars in view of the Australian Grand Prix," explained Sauber's chief engineer Jacky Eeckelaert. "In the morning Felipe also tested different brake parts and various aero configurations.

"In the afternoon he evaluated several tyre compounds also as a preparation for the first race of the season. Giancarlo tested different damper settings which we had simulated before on the 7-post-rig in the factory."

Jordan were the other team in action at Imola with both their racing drivers at the wheel of the new EJ14. German Nick Heidfeld finished as fifth quickest while his Italian teammate Giorgio Pantano was slowest almost two seconds off Heidfeld's pace.

"It's good to have two EJ14s running for the first time and at a track which brings out many challenges that we may see at the first races of the season in Melbourne and Sepang," said James Robinson, Jordan's head of test engineering. "We have been learning about those issues and how to address them today, which is clearly productive at this stage.

"All the Bridgestone teams are here and we have a comprehensive tyre programme with them for the forthcoming races, in that regard we hope the weather stays clear. Giorgio Pantano has had his first day of testing with us since we signed him - he has been shaking down the second EJ14, which is planned to be his race car.

"Now that we have over 2500km on the EJ14, tomorrow we hope to be able to start looking at performance criteria."

Testing resumes tomorrow.

Today's times:

Pos Driver Team-Engine Tyres Time Laps 1. Alonso Renault (M) 1:20.493 77 2. Trulli Renault (M) 1:20.767 84 3. Massa Sauber-Petronas (B) 1:22.028 69 4. Fisichella Sauber-Petronas (B) 1:22.331 62 5. Heidfeld Jordan-Ford (B) 1:22.408 62 6. Pantano Jordan-Ford (B) 1:24.274 60 All Timing Unofficial

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