Nico Rosberg says Mercedes could have completed more than their 148 laps today but they were limited by how many tyres they had.
“I’m very excited because it was a great test day,” said Rosberg after covering 655km (406 miles) in his W04.
“Just really consistent, got everything done we had on the plan – even early. We were done and we ran out of ideas what to do because you’re limited with tyres. In the end we did some pit stops and things like that.”
“I have no idea how fast we are,” he added. “But if I look now at what Ferrari’s done I’m not worried at all about their time.”
Mercedes introduced some new parts on their car today: “We made some progress with the new front wing today, good direction there,” he said.
“Struggling a bit with understeer at the moment and that’s what it’s about, we need to highlight now what our problems are, tell the factory so they can get on top of things ASAP.”
“From lap one with this car I feel comfortable. OK the balance still, understeer, is not great, there’s still some optimising to do. But I can push straight away, feel very comfortable, I feel what’s going on and that’s very nice.”
Rosberg was pleased to have covered so much ground given the team’s troubled start to testing:
“Today was very reliable, for sure. And I think the last two days were just massively unlucky because they were problems that (a) they were small things, and (b) that you’re not able to solve them within a day is just very unlucky. They just came about in a terrible way.
“Today really made up for it though, today was fantastic. It really put a smile on everybody’s face that it’s a fantastic achievement to drive form Silverstone to Spa distance-wise in one test day with the F1 car with no problem whatsoever.”
2013 F1 season
- Mercedes originally favoured Heidfeld for Hamilton’s seat
- Take F1 Fanatic’s new 2013 season quiz
- F1 Fanatic’s new year thanks and credits 2014
- The complete F1 Fanatic 2013 season review
- The drivers, teams and cars of 2013
Browse all 2013 F1 season articles
Image © F1 Fanatic | f1fanatic.co.uk
Aldoid
7th February 2013, 19:00
Nice. Hopefully Lewis gets some meaningful seat time as well with no reliability issues. I’m anxious to hear his assessment after a proper day’s running.
@HoHum (@hohum)
7th February 2013, 19:41
At least Lewis must be feeling better today about moving to MB.
BasCB (@bascb)
8th February 2013, 9:58
Yeah, I can imagine it should get the good vibes back and him pumped to go for it today.
kgriff
7th February 2013, 19:33
Echoing Aldoid… eager to hear Lewis’ comments as well.
Cornflakes (@cornflakes)
7th February 2013, 19:40
I wouldn’t call a rear brake failure as a small thing! Nor a fire on a car for that matter.
kgriff
7th February 2013, 20:12
@Cornflakes… no, not insignificant, but not fundamental to performance either. Glitches – much more easily solved – i imagine – than a lack of efficient downforce.
Rybo (@rybo)
7th February 2013, 20:46
Pace and downforce remains to be seen. Let’s not forget 2009 when Lewis said the -24 was the best car he had ever driven just to be 2 seconds off the front runners.
Max Power
7th February 2013, 21:19
@cornflakes… Rear brake failure is no small thing, but was explained as being caused by a small thing (brake pipe).
As for the fire that was seen, that was just fuel burning in the exhaust after the car auto-shutdown. The car itself was not on fire
Aldoid
7th February 2013, 20:52
Exactly. For example, the brake line failure could’ve been caused by something as innocuous as a loose or faulty fitting or clamp, & the earlier fire was said to have been caused by a faulty wire loom: both easily replaceable & possibly one off incidents. Heck, we’ve seen single bolts or clamps sideline race cars before. It doesn’t mean the whole package is inherently unreliable. If it’s not recurring, then it’s nothing more than a teething problem. That’s exactly why new car tests are sometimes considered “shakedowns”: turn up the juice & see what shakes loose!
mitchibob (@mitchibob)
7th February 2013, 21:09
I’m sure someone else has already mentioned it, but the W04 definitely looks like it was developed for the Aussie Grand Prix… certainly has the look of some of their wildlife!
Adam B (@lurker)
7th February 2013, 22:49
The Mercedes W04 – P(latypus) spec will be making it’s Debut in Australia.
I don’t know why haven’t painted one on the side yet. It’d be nice to see that they have a sense of humor about it.
kgriff
7th February 2013, 21:11
Yeah, Rybo… early days still. Far too early to say who’s on / off pace. But cautiously encouraged by seeing them not languishing down in 20th place on the first test. (Smirk).
AndrewTanner (@andrewtanner)
7th February 2013, 21:25
Glad to hear it, Nico! Keep it up. You have to be reasonably competitive this year.
Casanova (@casanova)
7th February 2013, 21:26
I wonder, is 655km a record distance for an F1 car to have covered in a single day?
Muulka
7th February 2013, 21:38
I would imagine Ferrari covered more during their private testing days early 2000’s :] i dont know though.
Overwatch (@overwatch)
7th February 2013, 22:11
Certainly not, Schumacher did 144 laps last year at Mugello which equals over 750 km.
LJ
7th February 2013, 23:13
Interesting that the car’s characteristic is still understeery all this time after Button has left.
Kingshark (@kingshark)
8th February 2013, 0:28
Button was with Brackley for 7 years. I think we might be underestimating what difference and impact he made on the team within that time.
josephrobert (@josephrobert)
8th February 2013, 9:06
More people should call Mercedes ‘Brackley’, I don’t think the Brackley squad are capable of making a better car than Redbull / Mclaren. The Brawn GP win was down to a loop hole they found and JB did a great job to hang on, unlike Rubans who finished 3rd. Hamilton going there won’t make any difference, Schumacher and Rosberg are great drivers.
I would have liked to see him go to Williams, there he could have made a difference as the 2012 car was fast but may not have had the best drivers to show it.
nathant
8th February 2013, 5:48
I hope Lewis gets similar amount of laps in on final day. On the livery front, I was really hoping for something with a little more BAM to it. considering they are sponsored by Monster as well, it just feels very bland to me.
Similar theme all along the pit IMO, all these companies with very smart people and they put horrible paint jobs on the cars :/
Aled Davies (@aledinho)
8th February 2013, 9:30
Yeah, would have really looked good if they had a bit of black somewhere with the monster green logo on! Plus a bit of black for the blackberry logo!
I think judging by what rosberg was doing yesterday it was mainly quite long-ish runs testing out tyre degredation over a stint etc#
I dont think there was much low fuel running there so I think the mercedes looks ok so far! hard to judge though