Theissen and Rampf have high hopes for Barcelona

BMW Motorsport Director Mario Theissen is more than pleased with his team's performance.

Over the first three rounds of this year's F1 season, the efforts of the BMW Sauber team resulted in a podium position at each Grand Prix so far, a fastest race lap, one pole position, and the lead of the constructors' championship – the latter being a historic first for the team.

"It was a textbook start to the season for our BMW Sauber F1 Team," Theissen proudly stated. "We're no longer the number three team, as last year, but over the first three races we have carved out our niche right up among the top three teams. The workforces in Munich and Hinwil are accordingly elated and fired up with incentive."

The three-week break between races was an opportunity to try out new components and configurations at the factory in addition to the four-day group test held on the Catalunya circuit, the same track which will serve for the Spanish Grand Prix next week-end.

"The race in Barcelona is almost like a second start to the season," Theissen remarked, in reference to the many developments all teams have been working on.

"The Circuit de Catalunya is one that makes wide-ranging demands and is frequently used for testing by the teams.

It has often served as a yardstick for their general competitiveness," Theissen explained. "Here all the teams will be taking a step forward on the development front, us included. Afterwards there will be a fresh assessment of how things stand."

For his part, Technical Director Willy Rampf is feeling impatient: "I can't wait to see how things pan out in Barcelona because almost all the teams have been testing improvements to their cars here last week."

"Everyone has made progress, but the key question is, how much compared to the competition? That's why it's set to be a very interesting race and one that will also point the way ahead for the coming weeks and months," he said.

"We've been pretty happy with our improvements, so we should be able to keep up with the front runners as before," Rampf confidently added. BMW Sauber