This morning we mainly focussed on aero tests to try and understand our new aero package, so I’m hoping we gathered some good data for the team. In the afternoon we had an issue with the engine which forced me to stop the second practice session early, so unfortunately I didn’t get to complete many laps. At the moment it seems quite difficult for us here, I’m not entirely comfortable with the car as I didn’t really find the right setup to make it work around this track. We’ve got a lot of work to do tonight to improve for tomorrow.

It was a good day in terms of reliability as everything ran smoothly. We had a very extensive programme to run today, testing new parts along with old aero configurations which was part of a large data gathering exercise. Given we spent most of the two sessions testing, I don’t think today’s lap times are representative of where we are. We have a lot of numbers for everyone to study overnight and hopefully we can put together the best package for tomorrow.

With the continual drive to keep adding performance to the car, we came to Silverstone with some further aero updates which were fitted to Pierre’s car for the whole day, and to Brendon’s for FP2. We spent the majority of FP1 carrying out detailed aero tests, running with a large aero rake at the start of the session with Pierre, it was quite a comprehensive test plan but we gathered all of the required data. We also worked on some further mechanical setup items to for car balance, which is another area we are continually trying to improve on our car. The second session was more of a conventional program, beginning with short runs and moving into long run simulations. The track temperature had increased by over 10 degrees Celsius compared to the morning which made a significant difference to the balance on both of our cars. We completed an extra run on the Medium tyre at the start of the session to rebalance the car around the heavily changed conditions. Unfortunately for Pierre, he appears to have had an issue with his PU which meant he missed out on completing his short run on Softs and did not get to cover the planned long run. The conditions for qualifying and the race are expected to be similar to those in FP2, so we have a bit of work to do to re-optimise the car around these temperatures and give the drivers a car they are more comfortable with.

Apart from the usual Friday programme, the team ran an aero comparison test today. With about 30 minutes remaining in FP2, Pierre had to park at the side of the track when we spotted something unusual on the data. However, as both drivers were running “Friday only” units, it was always our plan to change the PUs on both cars overnight.