Ricciardo blitzes final day at Jerez
Date published : 03 Dec 2009 - 20:15:29
Daniel Ricciardo set a blistering pace on the final day of Formula 1's young driver test at Jerez, finishing Thursday's session more than 1.3s clear of his nearest rival.Indeed the Australian's time of 1m17.418s was the best recorded at the Andalucian circuit this year, leaving Red Bull Racing duly impressed.Paul di Resta put in another fine performance for Force India to go second quickest despite causing two red flags in his half day of running.It was a little interrupted this afternoon with one spin into the gravel and then an electrical issue that stopped us out on track, so we lost some time in places, said the Scot.All the same the team ran through their programme and despite the stoppages we made progress and I think the team got some good results.I had a good time at the end and found some more performance so I'm happy on both accounts.Wednesday pacesetter Gary Paffett was third fastest in the McLaren after spending his afternoon at the wheel of the MP4-24 doing set-up and tyre analysis work. Mike Conway again shared the title-winning Brawn Mercedes with Marcus Ericsson and outpaced the Swede by 0.3s to finish a strong fourth on the timesheet.Williams driver Nico Hulkenberg was fifth quickest on his second day in the car and said the test had been a useful refresher course in driving a Formula 1 car as he steps up preparations for his first grand prix season.It was good for me to get back in the car and get some laps in before next year, said the German.I covered a lot of mileage, which I was pleased about, and I got used to driving the F1 car quite quickly, which I wasn't really expecting as it's been quite a long time since my last outing.The car felt good and we fitted in a lot of set-up work, so I'm happy with the two days.After making his debut F1 appearance with Renault on Tuesday as his prize for winning the Formula Renault 3.5 championship this year, Bertrand Baguette had a second outing with Sauber and posted the sixth best time.I'm happy that I managed to get in a good lap time on my very last run despite a lot of fuel on board, said the 23-year-old Belgian.The balance of the car was very good [and] I enjoyed the driving a lot.After a brief run on Tuesday afternoon, Oliver Turvey was given a second outing in the McLaren as part of his prize for winning the 2006 McLaren Autosport BRDC Award.The 22-year-old Cumbrian, who moves up from Formula Renault to GP2 next year, was an impressive third fastest in the morning before handing the MP4-24 over to Paffett and ultimately being shuffled down to seventh.Renault test driver Lucas di Grassi completed a mammoth 123 laps but was not particularly quick, while JR Hildebrand was unfortunate in losing his best opportunities to set fast times due to an engine glitch and an ill-timed red flag.Without those setbacks the American felt he would have been much higher up the order than 10th.Ferrari entrusted its F60 to the three top finishers in this year's Italian F3 championship, Mexican Pablo Sanchez Lopez shading Italians Daniel Zampieri and Marco Zipoli.Toro Rosso fielded New Zealander Brendon Hartley and Italian Mirko Bortolotti. Both were a long way off the pace but ran in heavyweight configuration virtually throughout to simulate 2010 fuel loads (when in-race refuelling will be banned).Renault gave Chinese youngster Ho-Pin Tung a brief four-lap run during the midday shower to allow him to experience an F1 car in damp conditions.Testing times from Jerez (December 3)1 RICCIARDO Red Bull 1m17.418s (77)2 DI RESTA Force India 1m18.736s (53)3 PAFFETT McLaren 1m18.746s (59)4 CONWAY Mercedes 1m19.096s (77)5 HULKENBERG Williams 1m19.226s (106)6 BAGUETTE Sauber 1m19.356s (70)7 TURVEY McLaren 1m19.358s (32)8 ERICSSON Mercedes 1m19.382s (49)9 DI GRASSI Renault 1m19.602s (123)10 HILDEBRAND Force India 1m19.873s (41)11 SANCHEZ Ferrari 1m21.068s (39)12 ZAMPIERI Ferrari 1m21.279s (42)13 ZIPOLI Ferrari 1m21.725s (41)14 HARTLEY Toro Rosso 1m22.493s (50)15 BORTOLOTTI Toro Rosso 1m23.271s (34)16 TUNG Renault 1m32.447s (4* number of laps completed in brackets
