By IANS
Jerez (Spain) : Force India continued to struggle for pace on the penultimate day of the three-day Formula One test session here with test driver Adrian Sutil placed at the bottom of the time charts.
Sutil completed 86 laps with a best of one minute, 22.244 seconds around the 4.428-km circuit as the team focussed on further testing the new parts that were fitted on to the car here Wednesday. Force India’s lead driver, Giancarlo Fisichella, will take over duties from Sutil later Thursday.
“Even though the weather today was clear, the winds were so strong that it was difficult to do any real work on set-up as we had planned. Sometimes, the balance was good, sometimes it was bad and you just couldn’t tell very much from the laps. We still managed to do 86 laps though with no mechanical problems, which is useful, particularly after we had a shortened day last time,” said Sutil in a statement.
Mark Webber of Red Bull Racing was the quickest of the 16 drivers on view as he clocked a searing 1:18.628, ahead of Williams drivers Nico Rosberg (1:19.091) and Kazuki Nakajima (1:19.215).
Double World champion Fernando Alonso (Renault) was fourth quickest with 1:19.710, followed by Robert Kubica of BMW Sauber (1:19.829) and Lewis Hamilton of McLaren (1:19.857).