Vettel dominates opening morning in Jerez

UPDATE Sunday testing is over and Fastest lap overall remained Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull Racing) with a time of 1:19.055 min over the 4.428 km circuit. Some drivers were testing 2010 spec Bridgestone tires for next year. Testing continues for another 4 days.

03/01/09

F1's best driver by a wide margin, Sebastian Vettel, goes fastest in the lowly Red Bull car. Imagine him in a McLaren!

Pre-season testing resumed today in Jerez, as eight teams took to the track to kick-start this week's five-day session, unusually beginning on a Sunday. Other than Toro Rosso and Honda, all teams were on duty, while most of the attention was being attracted by Force India, who debuted their VJM02 at the hands of Giancarlo Fisichella.

Although the weather was overcast and dry for the entire morning session, light drizzle began to fall just after lunchtime, before descending into a heavy shower shortly afterwards. Although the weather is expected to clear up in a few hours, rain is highly likely for the remaining days of the test.

Over the course of the morning session, just a single red flag period stopped running, when Felipe Massa stopped on-track just after noon. A second red flag was caused by Nico Rosberg after lunch, bringing the action to a halt for 20 minutes.

In the Force India garage, Giancarlo Fisichella has completed 19 laps so far, as he put the VJM02 through its paces. Today is the second time the VJM02 has been run on-track, after a shakedown was conducted at Silverstone last week.

On the timesheets meanwhile, after leading much of the morning, Felipe Massa was firmly outpaced by Vettel as we drifted towards lunchtime, with the German clocking an impressive time of 1m19.055s, over a second and a half faster than Massa. Toyota's Kamui Kobayashi and Williams’ Nico Rosberg occupied third and fourth places.

Testing continues this afternoon.

Unofficial morning times from Jerez:
1. Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull-Renault) – 1:19.055, 52 laps
2. Felipe Massa (Ferrari) – 1:20.664, 41 laps
3. Kamui Kobayashi (Toyota) – 1:21.384, 42 laps
4. Nico Rosberg (Williams-Toyota) – 1:21.418, 37 laps
5. Robert Kubica (BMW Sauber-BMW) – 1:21.967, 16 laps
6. Nelson Piquet Jr. (Renault) – 1:22.266, 34 laps
7. Giancarlo Fisichella (Force India-Mercedes) – 1:22.340, 19 laps
8. Pedro de la Rosa (McLaren-Mercedes) – 1:22.511, 61 laps