WilliamsF1 completes four day Valencia Test

The Williams BMW FW27 made its track debut at the Valencia circuit this week for a four day test following its launch on Monday. Nick Heidfeld joined Mark Webber for the duration of the test, following the announcement that the German will partner Mark for the forthcoming season.

Conditions for the final day of testing at the Circuit de la Comunitat Valencia Ricardo Tormo continued with sunshine. Mark Webber and Nick Heidfeld continued the BMW WilliamsF1 Team's preparations of the FW27.

Mark would focus on chassis set up, completing eighty nine laps, with a best lap time of 1m:11.049, while Nick, who concentrated on tyre testing, completed ninety laps, posting a best time of, 1m:10.748 to finish ahead of his team-mate.

The BMW WilliamsF1 Team drivers completed 722 laps of the Valencia circuit over the four days, a total of 2,888 kilometers. Having driven 378 laps, Nick covered the highest mileage of any driver over the week. The duo will continue the team's test programme next week with a four day test at Jerez commencing on Tuesday.

WilliamsF1 Technical Director Sam Michael commented on the four days of testing by saying: "We have just finished a weeks test in Valencia with the FW27. It's always good to get the first test of a new car underway to learn how the set-up works.

Nick and Mark shared testing duties, checking systems, heat rejection, brake cooling and many other items that are necessary to benchmark with a totally new car. There was also plenty of tyre testing to do with Michelin.

There were no major reliability problems with the FW27 and, as such, the daily
mileage the drivers recorded was high. There is a lot of development work to do
before Melbourne to ensure that we are in a competitive position and I've no doubt
that 2005 will be a long, hard battle for the Championship with competition from all the teams."

Driver Team Time Gap Laps

01 M. Schumacher Ferrari 1'10''209 121
02 J. Button BAR Honda 1'10''599 0''390 120
03 R. Barrichello Ferrari 1'10''681 0''472 100
04 N. Heidfeld WilliamsF1 1'10''748 0''539 90
05 J. Trulli Toyota 1'10''814 0''605 100
06 M. Webber WilliamsF1 1'11''049 0''840 89
07 R. Schumacher Toyota 1'11''635 1''426 88
08 R. Zonta Toyota 1'11''841 1''632 13
09 E. Bernoldi BAR Honda 1'12''298 2''089 70
10 A. Carroll BAR Honda 1'12''588 2''379 24
11 J. Rossiter BAR Honda 1'13''112 2''903 53