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"The first signs
are encouraging," is how Ferrari Managing Director Jean Todt
summed up the first day of practice for the Bahrain Grand
Prix, the curtain raiser to the 2006 Formula 1 season.
Although the time sheets can be misleading on a Friday, with
teams running different programmes and those outside the top
four benefiting from the unrestricted use of a third driver,
it does seem that Todt's assessment looks accurate at the
moment. Michael Schumacher finished the first and second
hours in fourth and second places respectively and, on his
first official race weekend appearance, team-mate Felipe
Massa was eighth and fourth.
Quicker than Michael was Anthony Davidson, the Englishman
continuing this season as third driver for what was the BAR
team, but is now rebranded as the Honda team. Another third
driver is third, in the shape of Alex Wurz. He too is
continuing a role he had in 2005, except that he has
switched from McLaren to Williams. Behind Felipe comes the
man who has taken over the "Number 1" sticker on his car
that Michael Schumacher had previously made his own property
for so many years: Fernando Alonso in the Renault.
Completing the top six on the first active day of the season
was the Scuderia Toro Rosso (formerly Minardi) car of Tonio
Liuzzi.
Apart from all the rule changes both technical and sporting
that apply this year, the most obvious novelty for 2006 is
that there are eleven teams, with the arrival of the Super
Aguri F1 team, run by former GP driver, Aguri Suzuki and
using Honda engines. With seven teams therefore eligible to
run a third car, no less than 28 cars were out on track
today.
Another interesting piece of news to emerge here in Bahrain
is that all teams have agreed to a restriction on the amount
of testing they can do, in order to reduce costs. The
formula for the restriction is fairly complex, but
essentially the number of days during the season are limited
to 36. However, each team can nominate a "home" track and
one day's testing at this circuit counts only as a half day.
Circuits such as Barcelona, which are popular for testing
and also host a grand prix cannot be selected as a "home"
track. In addition, straight line testing for aerodynamic
testing, which Ferrari for example carries out at the
Vairano straight, does not have to be included in these 36
days, but is limited to a total of 12 days. In addition,
there is a limit to the number of kilometres that can be
completed to prevent a team turning up for a test with three
cars and thus covering a high and therefore expensive
mileage.
Jean Todt: "It's always quite an emotional moment when the
cars go out on the first day of practice of a new season.
New engines (2.4 litre V8), new teams, new drivers and many
unanswered questions: one can't get an answer after just two
hours of free practice but on Sunday evening we'll
definitely have a clearer picture. Today we worked mainly on
the set-up of the 248 F1, starting from the information we'd
gathered from the testing we did here in February.
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