Wurz says KERS is safe enough

KERS had been a cause for big concern among teams after a BMW Sauber mechanic received an electric shock in an incident during testing at Jerez in July.

However, with that incident believed to be an isolated case, teams have returned to action with their devices this week - as Williams, McLaren and Honda all ran cars fitted with the systems, even if some were just dummy devices and not fully active.

Honda Racing have already completed tests with KERS at Santa Pod and Silverstone, but Jerez this week was their first chance to run the system at length.

And despite joking about the safety precautions he had to take prior to the test, Wurz was pleased with how the run went.

"I went to the hairdressers beforehand so my hair could not catch fire!" Wurz told autosport.com. "No, seriously, it is quite safe. Honda has an enormous amount of know how with the battery system and we have some security checks all the time going on, so we are very confident that we won't be electrocuted."

When asked if he could feel the difference KERS made to driving, Wurz said: "Yes. Thank god I feel it! If I wouldn't feel the 60 kilowatts, then I should not be a test driver.

"I have driven it before in a shakedown, the very first time the KERS was in the car at Santa Pod, and now it is interesting to drive it on the track. It has different effects on the car, and feeling how power output is interesting. It is all good.

"It is not that extreme, but you do feel it and it is quite nice. It works and, in the end, it is not rocket science. The car companies already have KERS in road cars, but the difficulty for F1 is getting it packaged."

Wurz said it was too early to judge, however, how good Honda's KERS system was compared to the opposition.

"It is impossible to answer because we don't know the output of the other teams, how they store the energy, so we cannot say. I would hope we are ahead, but there is no guarantee."