Poor weather limits mileage for Piquet

The ING Renault F1 Team wrapped up its pre-Monaco Grand Prix test today, completing a third day of running at the Paul Ricard HTTT circuit near le Castellet. Weather conditions were poor with heavy rain arriving in the middle of the morning, which restricted running and forced the team to rethink its programme.

Nelson Piquet remained in the R28 as the track configuration was altered to suit a lower downforce set-up. The team had planned to begin its preparations for next month’s Canadian Grand Prix, but with such poor track conditions the team elected to remain in the garage for most of the day and the Brazilian only completed 60 laps.

Despite the low mileage today, it has been a productive test for the team, with most of the objectives completed. The team therefore approaches the Monaco Grand Prix in good shape and looks forward to building on the progress shown at the Turkish Grand Prix.

Nelson Piquet: “Quite a frustrating day really, but there was no point in doing lots of miles in the wet conditions. Fortunately we did a lot of laps yesterday and got most of our work done because we knew that it was likely to be wet today. So a good week overall and I think we are well prepared for Monaco next week.”

Christian Silk, Chief Test Engineer: “There was not much to be learnt today because of the poor weather, but Nelson managed a couple of runs in the dry this morning and was pretty happy with the car on the longer circuit and everything was working well on the car. For a lot of the day it was too wet to be safe to run, but when it was safe enough we got out and did some basic set-up work, and gave Nelson some more wet weather experience.”

Nelson Piquet R28-04, 60 laps, 210km, fastest lap 1:31.634