Weather affects Formula One testing

JEREZ - Rain again played havoc with the Formula One schedule at the Circuito de Jerez here and Force Indias drivers Vitantonio Liuzzi and reserve Paul di Resta could only put in 57 laps altogether.

With the heavy rain showers and high winds that have so far characterised the testing showing no signs of abating, Force India was Thursday obliged to modify its testing schedule slightly to allow the race drivers the best chance of the better weather forecast later this week, with di Resta getting another half day testing in the VJM03 before Liuzzi took over in the afternoon.

The team made the most of the amended programme to run through further set-up evaluation, plus race preparation and fuel and hydraulic systems checks. With no major issues, di Resta and Liuzzi, who clocked a best of 1 minute, 30.666 seconds, completed over 250 km in all.

Commenting on his run, di Resta said: I was back in the car this morning to get a bit more running. Unfortunately, the weather was again very bad, but at this stage, any running gives me more experience of the car and how the team works.

“I ran with the intermediate and wet tyres over the morning, which at least means I have got some solid experience of wet running and it won’t be such a novelty when I am faced with similar conditions in places such as Malaysia.”

Liuzzi said: “The weather was so difficult today with the constantly changing conditions. It seemed to rain every hour and then dry, but it never reached a stable level: it was either too dry for wets or too wet for dry tyres, so you couldn’t get a consistent indicator of the performance.

“We did a few pit stop simulations and runs to get more information and the car still seems to be responding well to changes. In these conditions though it’s very difficult to get a good understanding of what’s going on, but everyone has the same weather, we just have to do what we can.”