Scuderia Toro Rosso made a solid start to the weekend at
Spa-Francorchamps during Friday's two practice sessions:
Jaime Alguersuari enjoying driving in the rain in the
Ferrari V8-powered STR5 and hoping wet race tomorrow
while Sebastien Buemi was slowed slightly in terms of
his preparations by a gearbox problem.
Jaime Alguersuari (STR5-03)
“It was actually good fun
driving [Friday], as we experienced every track
condition possible. From what we saw, I will be hoping
for a wet race on Sunday, as I think we are more
competitive in these conditions, giving us a better
chance to get into the points. Because of the rain,
there is a question mark over tyre performance in the
dry on high fuel loads, but that is the same for
everyone. The car felt quite good in both the dry and
the wet, but we still need more data on the tyre front.
Because of the different conditions with teams running
various types of tyre at different times, it is very
difficult to understand the order amongst us, so I think
we can expect another very interesting day tomorrow.”
First Practice Session -
Best lap 2.04.250, pos. 16th, 16 laps; Second Practice
Session - Best lap 1.50.682, pos. 14th, 25 laps
Sebastien Buemi (STR5-02)
“We had an issue on the gearbox
in the morning, but in reality we did not lose much
running time because it was raining so hard at that
time. At least it meant I saved the wear on my rain
tyres. In the second session, when it dried up, it was
difficult to get a true picture relating to our
performance, as everyone was trying something different.
The important thing now is to do a good job of analyzing
all our data, in terms of car set-up and the difference
between the two slick compounds and see what we can do
for tomorrow. In the dry, I was quite happy on the hard
compound, but with the option, I did not get the tyres
to work properly, so I did not get the most out of them
and we will have to look at that in tomorrow morning’s
session.”
First Practice Session -
Best lap 2.05.680, pos. 18th, 6 laps; Second Practice
Session - Best lap 1.51.523, pos. 17th, 25 laps
Laurent Mekies (Chief
Engineer)
“A typical day at Spa in terms
of the weather. In the morning we had a gearbox issue
with Sebastien’s car, but luckily, as conditions were
very bad, we did not lose so much track time. In the
morning, we only used the extreme rain tyres and then in
the afternoon, we got the chance to run the
intermediates and both types of dry tyre, so altogether
it was quite a good day in terms of collecting a useful
amount of data. The forecast for the rest of the weekend
is predicting more mixed conditions and wet weather
would definitely suit us best for the race, so that is
what we are hoping for.”
