Vettel - Reliability the key to a successful first test

Sebastian Vettel today closed out the first pre-season test in Jerez with another 96 laps and 425km in the Infiniti Red Bull Racing RB9. He left the circuit saying that the new car’s good reliability across the four-day programme had been the key to a successful week.

“I think for the whole team it’s been quite a good test,” he said. “No problems in terms of reliability and we did a lot of laps, so I’m quite pleased with the results.

Sebastian Vettel, Red Bull Racing RB9

Photo by: XPB Images

I feel a bit better than last year. I think we had some issues with reliability then, so it seems we have done our homework well.

“Regarding the stoppage today, I don’t know why the track started to break up but I guess everyone is on the limit here, running wide, using the maximum amount of track and the kerbs and unfortunately it started to break up.

But the circuit did a very good job over lunch to get everything sorted and gave us an extra half hour at the end, so no real problem.

“Looking ahead, I think the Barcelona test will maybe reveal a bit more, but just because people are running more and teams will play around a bit more there.

So if you keep your eyes open you might spot some stuff,” he added. “However, as I’ve said before, we just focus on what we do. In Barcelona we’ll learn more about ourselves and maybe a little bit about our rivals. It should be interesting.”

Race Engineering Co-ordinator Andy Damerum said: “Our final day here in Jerez has again been a good one, even if there were a few interruptions.

Obviously we had the stoppage for the track repair and then late in the day we ended our work early when we had a small problem with one of the test items we were evaluating.

Nothing serious but after that we felt that it was a good time to bring the shutters down on the week’s work. On the whole we’ve had a very good first test. I think both drivers would say they’re happy.

We put another 425km on the car today, which means we’ve logged a total of 1,652km this week, which is very satisfying. Next week we’ll pour through all the data, learn from it and then head to Barcelona for the second test.”

JEREZ TEST – DAY FOUR
Driver: Sebastian Vettel
Car: RB9
Laps: 96 laps
Best time: 1:18.565
Circuit length: 4.428km
Fastest lap: K. Raikkonen (1:18.148)

Red Bull Racing