Toro Rosso Pirelli test report day 1

Circuit: Yas Marina Circuit -- 5.554 km
Driver: Jaime Alguersuari
Chassis: STR5 -03
Best time: 1:42.019, 71 laps

This was a significant day for Formula 1, as it was the first ever track test for all teams using tyres supplied by Pirelli, the Italian company which has a contract as the sole tyre supplier for the sport, for the next three seasons.

Each team was supplied with four sets of tyres for today -- two Prime, which corresponds to a medium compound tyre on the Pirelli listing and two Option or Soft compound tyres. Jaime Alguersuari was at the wheel of the STR5 and spent the morning evaluating how the car behaved on the new tyres, as well as working on set-up to suit them. In the afternoon, work began on evaluating tyre performance and behaviour over long and short runs.

"It was a useful experience for me to run on these new tyres," said Jaime Alguersuari. "We did a good mileage, some runs on heavy fuel and some with less and it was interesting to see how the tyres behaved. It is too early to say more than that, because of course there will be more development to come from Pirelli before the next season starts."

"From the car side, we had a trouble free day," said Chief Engineer, Laurent Mekies. "Track conditions are now very different to those over the race weekend, partly because of the two days of running during the young driver test. The day went well and we are now preparing for the second day of running with Pirelli, when Sebastien Buemi will take over at the wheel."

-source: toro rosso