Valencia 4: Montagny tops test

Meanwhile at Catalunya, Ferrari's hybrid 2004/05 car made its public debut and set the pace in Luca Badoer's hands.

Ferrari will enter its upgraded 2004 car in the first four races of the championship before unveiling its definitive 2005 model at Imola. The revised chassis' complex front wing arrangement attracted plenty of attention in Barcelona, where Badoer set the afternoon pace after McLaren's Juan Pablo Montoya had been fastest in the morning.

The Colombian ended up third - just under 0.7s slower than Ferrari's pacesetting test driver - with Michael Schumacher second on his return from his traditional prolonged winter break. Sauber's Felipe Massa was the only other driver present at Catalunya, and was around a second slower than Montoya.

While Montagny completed 71 laps at Valencia in Renault's 2004 chassis, returning race driver Giancarlo Fisichella had his first go in the new R25 and was second quickest despite a minor unspecified technical problem in the morning.

Although Fisichella did not talk to the press, Renault engineers revealed that he "went home very happy" and had been extremely impressed with the new car. Fernando Alonso had reported similar sentiments earlier in the week even though his test was disrupted by very strong winds, and the general feeling in the Valencia paddock was that Renault is currently looking very strong indeed.

BAR had the most eventful day. Takuma Sato was third quickest but all his attempts to complete long runs (to test tyre durability) were stymied by red flags, two of which were caused by the team's test driver Davidson - who first lost time to a transmission programme and then suffered a spectacular engine failure. This was BAR-Honda's fourth major engine problem since testing of the new 007 chassis began last week. According to Honda sources, the same component was responsible for all four incidents, and a redesigned replacement will arrive from Japan in time for the next Valencia test.

At least Sato and Davidson managed some running - unlike team leader Jenson Button, who had to rest in his motorhome all day after a problem with his HANS device caused muscle spasms during Thursday's testing.

Jarno Trulli was also within 0.7s of the pace in the new Toyota, while the team's test driver Olivier Panis completed the list of runners despite still suffering from a very heavy cold.

This week's Valencia running is now complete, but the Barcelona activity continues into the weekend.



Franck Montagny (Renault)*, 1m10.252s, 71 laps
Giancarlo Fisichella (Renault), 1m10.636s, 56
Takuma Sato (BAR), 1m10.803s, 61
Anthony Davidson (BAR), 1m10.841s, 68
Jarno Trulli (Toyota), 1m10.928s, 40
Olivier Panis (Toyota), 1m11.688s, 37



Luca Badoer (Ferrari)*, 1m15.899s, 60 laps
Michael Schumacher (Ferrari)*, 1m16.002s, 52
Juan Pablo Montoya (McLaren), 1m16.536s, 37
Felipe Massa (Sauber), 1m17.470s, 47

* denotes 2004 chassis, or 2004/5 hybrid