Jaguar Silverstone test 2001-08-21

Silverstone: Day One

Jaguar Racing was out in force today at Silverstone, in a bid to quickly address the coming challenges. Eddie Irvine and Pedro de la Rosa were joined by F3 star Andre Lotterer, on a three-car test schedule. But it was the McLarens which topped the time sheets, with Alex Wurz quickest and Mika Hakkinen second. Eddie Irvine went third fastest, a mere 0.04s behind Hakkinen.

The weather was warm but quite windy and all the best times were set in the morning session. Mika Hakkinen's MP4-16 was still using a high-downforce configuration, sporting the new rear wing design first seen in Hungary. He ran well in the morning but appeared to have a problem in the afternoon, doing only a few laps as a result.

Eddie spent all day tyre testing, while Pedro worked on suspension and set-up options. The Spaniard had a slight problem which restricted his running in the morning but ran very well in the slower afternoon conditions.

Andre Lotterer had his patient head on today, charged with the simple yet demanding task of being as consistent as possible. The team was using a current chassis to test various electronics in development for next year's car, the R3. The German completed his programme successfully, putting in many short stints, end to end.

Several teams decamped to Barcelona at the last minute resulting in a relatively quiet day at the Northamptonshire circuit (if 'quiet' can ever be applied to F1). This is a two-day test and tomorrow jaguar-racing.com will be at the track again, along with a privileged group of Racing Club members, on the long awaited Jaguar Racing Fan Day. So stay tuned...

Silverstone test times, from Day One:
1. A. Wurz (McLaren) 1m24.167s (59 laps)
2. M. Hakkinen (Mclaren) 1m24.743 (16)
3. E. Irvine (Jaguar Racing) 1m24.789 (23)
4. P. de la Rosa (Jaguar Racing) 1m25.461s (40)
5. J. Verstappen (Arrows) 1m26.068s (41)
6. E. Bernoldi (Arrows) 1m26.265s (65)
7. A. Lotterer (Jaguar Racing) 1m26.711s (41)

- Jaguar Racing/www.jaguar-racing.com