Briscoe on top as cut tyres affect test

Penske driver Briscoe's 25.1984-second (212.156mph) lap last night stood up as the fastest of the week. However, he was one of several drivers who lost a set of tyres to an unidentified abrasive agent on the surface of the 1.5-mile oval.

More than an hour of Wednesday's five-hour session was lost to caution periods in which safety workers attempted to determine what was causing large cuts in tyres. Despite the trouble, no tyre failures or accidents were reported during the two days.

"After one run today, we'd lost a set of tyres because we cut one," Briscoe said. "We used our last set pretty soon after dinner, but we did get as much as we could out of what we had. I never did hear from the league why we were cutting tyres, but my crew told me the one I cut was pretty deep."

Several other teams lost precious sets of rubber, and many teams cut short their intended mileage because they ran low on allotted tyres. One team manager speculated that the problem may have stemmed from mesh wiring below the asphalt surface, noting the same thing happened at the previous year's preseason Homestead test. A Firestone spokesman said he couldn't identify the cause of the problem.

Last year's tyre problems during the test didn't reappear during the race a few months later. This year's Homestead race won't be held until October.

In spite of the problem, 22 car and driver combinations completed nearly 4,700 laps during the two days. Among the highlights of the sessions was the impressive performance of Mario Moraes for KV Racing Technology. Moraes, the 20-year-old Brazilian who moved from Dale Coyne Racing to KV during the off-season, ran well throughout both sessions, eventually scoring the sixth-fastest lap overall.

"It was a good start to the season," Moraes said. "The team is at a good pace. Actually we weren't looking for speed. We were looking to have a better car for the races. We were working on race set-up and happened to catch some drafts. I'm enjoying working with Jimmy (Vasser), and I'm just trying to learn the most I can from him."

Vasser, the team co-owner who parted ways with veterans Oriol Servia and Will Power during the winter break, congratulated his new driver at the end of Wednesday's session.

"He's not afraid to stick his nose in there and mix it up," Vasser said. "He's still got a learning curve, but he's a good kid. I couldn't be happier. He did a fantastic job both days. I don't think he's used to working with so many engineers, but I'm sure it's a welcome thing for him."

Defending IndyCar and Indianapolis 500 champion Scott Dixon had the second-fastest lap overall for Chip Ganassi Racing and also recorded the most laps during the two days at 282.

Marco Andretti was third-fastest in combined times, followed by his Andretti Green Racing teammate Tony Kanaan, 2007 champion Dario Franchitti (Ganassi), Moraes and Power, currently the fill-in for Helio Castroneves at Team Penske.

"We took a lot of data from yesterday and worked away at it," Power said. "We were really comfortable with the Team Penske car at the end. It was good to get some miles under my belt.

"We worked on a number of different set-ups and learned as much as we could about the car. It's good for me to have a couple of days like this where you get to know everyone on the team."

Mike Conway was the top rookie for Dreyer & Reinbold on Wednesday night in an impressive eighth place, as Robert Doornbos (Newman/Haas/Lanigan) fell to 17th after going the wrong way on set-up, having been the best of the newcomers on Tuesday.

A further open test is scheduled at the Barber Motorsports Park road course in Birmingham, Alabama, on 22-23 March, before the season commences at St Petersburg on 5 April.

Wednesday's testing times:

Pos  Driver            Team                 Speed
 1.  Ryan Briscoe      Penske               212.156
 2.  Scott Dixon       Ganassi              211.825
 3.  Marco Andretti    Andretti Green       211.274
 4.  Tony Kanaan       Andretti Green       210.819
 5.  Mario Moraes      KV                   210.603
 6.  Will Power        Penske               210.544
 7.  Dan Wheldon       Panther              210.402
 8.  Mike Conway       Dreyer & Reinbold    210.225
 9.  Graham Rahal      Newman/Haas/Lanigan  210.088
10.  Hideki Mutoh      Andretti Green       209.995
11.  Dario Franchitti  Ganassi              209.810
12.  Vitor Meira       Foyt                 209.475
13.  EJ Viso           HVM                  209.355
14.  Danica Patrick    Andretti Green       209.333
15.  Milka Duno        Newman/Haas/Lanigan  208.984
16.  Ed Carpenter      Vision               208.925
17.  Robert Doornbos   Newman/Haas/Lanigan  208.906
18.  Raphael Matos     Luczo Dragon         208.281
19.  Justin Wilson     Dale Coyne           208.108
20.  Jaime Camara      Conquest             206.744
21.  Stanton Barrett   3G                   206.266