Alonso fastest at Silverstone again

Eleven drivers from six teams took to the Silverstone circuit on September 14th, where testing continued for the second day. Renault's Fernando Alonso was again the quickest man, his best on Wednesday a 1:17.018 with a total of 111 laps. Teammate Giancarlo Fisichella was also at work and posted the fourth fastest time.

Fernando Alonso.

Photo by xpb.cc.

Tonio Liuzzi was the faster of the two Red Bulls on track in second, while teammate Christian Klien was eighth. McLaren had both its test drivers on duty again, Alex Wurz third fastest and Pedro de la Rosa was 11th. The pair worked on set up and tyres, de la Rosa once more putting the new V8 engine through its paces after its first run on Tuesday.

"There is obviously a big difference in power between the Mercedes-Benz V10 and the V8, but this can be adapted to by adjusting your driving style," he said. "We are currently on a steep learning and it is early days, but so far all is going well and we have a long Winter testing programme to look forward to, to continue our development programme."

Ralf Schumacher and tester Olivier Panis were at work for Toyota, fifth and eighth on the time sheet respectively. Williams also employed its test drivers, Nico Rosberg sixth and Antonio Pizzonia seventh. "We had a productive day of testing today with Antonio and Nico," said test team manager Tim Newton.

"Both drivers completed tyre evaluations and suspension work. Antonio had a brief off this morning due to a fault on the car but the problem was quickly identified and rectified allowing Antonio to continue running this afternoon. Both Antonio and Nico will continue testing tomorrow, the last day of the test."

It seems that Pizzonia may be deputising for Nick Heidfeld again in Brazil and possibly for all three remaining races. Still recovering from his crash during Monza testing, Heidfeld has now fractured his shoulder in an accident while out cycling. There has been speculation that Williams may decide to try Rosberg in the race seat in Japan or China.

Sakon Yamamoto was the 12th man on the time sheet at Silverstone, trying out the Jordan. Yamamoto will be the team's third driver on the Friday of the Japanese GP. He currently competes in Formula Nippon and the Super GT series. BAR tester Anthony Davidson also tried out the Jordan this week.

Ferrari continued its solo test at Jerez, where test driver Marc Gen? completed 99 laps working on tyres with a best time of 1:18.861. BAR also continued to work in Spain, with Takuma Sato and Jenson Button joined at Barcelona by development driver James Rossiter. Sato was the fastest of the trio, 1:15.010, and the work focused on brakes, tyres and aero evaluation.