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    • Barcelona Test Day Three: Kovalainen Breaks Ferrari Dominance

    Posted on November 15th, 2007 by Oliver White in Testing

    Michael Schumacher was absent from the Ferrari F2007 today as Felipe Massa and Luca Badoer took over the testing duties at Circuit de Catalunya in Barcelona. Perhaps it was this that lead to Ferrari having their dominance broken, Renault driver Heikki Kovalainen topping the timing sheets on the third and final day of the test. Felipe Massa came in second and almost 0.5s adrift of the Renault and 0.3s clear of Franck Montagny, who drove the Toyota for the last time today. Ferrari test driver Badoer lapped the circuit in 1m21.741s and was placed sixth at the end of the proceedings, having been beaten by an impressive lap from Sebastian Vettel in the Toro Rosso and David Coulthard in the Red Bull.

    McLaren were out in force with testers Pedro De La Rosa and Gary Paffett, despite the team attending the FIA hearing in London. The verdict of which is due tomorrow, and I’m sure the headlines haven’t been missed by anyone throughout the day. The words have been said and despite McLaren insisting they aren’t looking for the drivers title, their lawyers appeared to have missed the memo. And of course, Ferrari have retaliated with warnings about the damage this may cause to Formula One. Honestly, I think the damage has already been done, but a change in winner certainly wouldn’t help.

    But back to the test, De La Rosa led the Mercedes powered team with a seventh fastest time, while Paffett ended the day down in tenth. Champ Car retiree and F1-newbie Sebastien Bourdais impressed in the second Rosso going ninth for the squad just behind Williams charger Nico Rosberg. Both BMW drivers were working hard again as was second Williams driver Kazuki Nakajima.

    Christian Klien took to the Force India car for the second time in his bid to secure the drive for next year, as did Rosso-refugee Vitantonio Liuzzi. Klien went fastest of the two in fifteenth and Liuzzi managed seventeenth, sandwiching Jenson Button in the Honda. Mike Conway took to the second Honda while James Rossiter returned to Super Aguri to run the RA107. The Red Bull of Robert Doornbos propped up the timing sheet.

    1. Heikki Kovalainen Renault 1m20.659s
    2. Felipe Massa Ferrari 1m21.044s
    3. Franck Montagny Toyota 1m21.363s
    4. Sebastian Vettel Scuderia Toro Rosso 1m21.486s
    5. David Coulthard Red Bull Racing 1m21.555s
    6. Luca Badoer Ferrari 1m21.741s
    7. Pedro De La Rosa McLaren 1m21.805s
    8. Nico Rosberg Williams 1m21.820s
    9. Sebastien Bourdais Scuderia Toro Rosso 1m21.939s
    10. Gary Paffett McLaren 1m22.070s
    11. Nick Heidfeld BMW 1m22.460s
    12. Robert Kubica BMW 1m22.706s
    13. Kazuki Nakajima Williams 1m23.039s
    14. Jarno Trulli Toyota 1m23.064s
    15. Christian Klien Force India 1m23.084s
    16. Jenson Button Honda 1m23.118s
    17. Vitantonio Liuzzi Force India 1m23.206s
    18. Mike Conway Honda 1m23.729s
    19. James Rossiter Super Aguri 1m23.931s
    20. Robert Doornbos Red Bul Racing 1m24.102s
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    6 Comments For This Post
    Feel free to add your own using the comment form at the bottom.

    1. bigotez

      November 15th, 2007 - 7:44pm

      kovalainen’s time was deleted when it was found that he skipped the last chicane, so massa’s first :)

    2. Oliver White

      November 15th, 2007 - 9:07pm

      Yep, as reported on Autosport. I’m not changing the title now, but Kovalainen finished second, and Ferrari’s dominance continued.

    3. Alianora La Canta

      November 16th, 2007 - 11:51am

      It’s nice to see the Force Indias mixed in with the Hondas.

    4. Alianora La Canta

      November 16th, 2007 - 11:52am

      Hey! That comment went through without going to moderation. I don’t know what you’ve done to the system, Ollie, but I think you’ve fixed the problem :)

    5. Oliver White

      November 16th, 2007 - 1:28pm

      I may or may not have checked a box when I moved the site over to a new server. This may, or may not, have caused every single comment to go straight to moderation. But now, as it stands, a commenter must have a previously approved comment before it automatically shows, hence why WordPress likes you now, Alianora.

      Thanks to everyone for your patience.

      Yep, thought you might enjoy the Force India’s getting in the mix. I’m a little surprised that Klien is (on the face of it) performing better than Liuzzi, despite Liuzzi getting in more miles this year in the car and Klien forced to do limited testing.

    6. Alianora La Canta

      November 17th, 2007 - 4:08pm

      Thank you for the explanation of the comment behaviour, Ollie.

      There’s not a huge amount in the gap between Liuzzi and Klien (0.22s), so maybe they were using different settings. Simply because the test is primarily a driver evaluation for Force India doesn’t stop it from using it for other purposes as well.

      The other striking result is that of STR. If they carry on like that, everyone from BMW down the pecking order should be scared…

    1 Trackbacks For This Post

    1. Post-Season Tests: 2007 vs. 2008 » BlogF1

      November 19th, 2008 - 9:06pm

      [...] 2007 Barcelona Testing Day Three [...]

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