Fisi's first test as official race driver

By Karl King
January 16 2008

Giancarlo Fisichella was in action on Tuesday for Force India in his first test event as one of the team's official race drivers. The Italian continued with set-up work and adjustment to 2008 electronics began by Tonio Liuzzi on Monday. The day's action in Jerez was fairly trouble-free with Fisi managing to complete more than a full race distance, a total of 76 laps.

Fisico's fastest lap was a 1m20.764, good enough for 12th ahead only of Kamui Kobayashi who was just shy of 1.3 seconds slower.

Giancarlo's fastest lap was 1.216 seconds off the pace-setting time of Fernando Alonso - a 1m19.503.

'Not too bad today', Fisi commented. 'The circuit was damp in the morning, but by midday it was getting better. We did most of the programme, but unfortunately we had some minor mechanical issues. At the end with the new tyres there was a possibility to have a faster time, but unfortunately there was traffic and then I made a mistake, but it's quite encouraging. I think we can improve quite a lot as we are going in the right direction.'

Mike Gascoyne, chief technical officer added, 'A better day today with improved track conditions and especially fewer red flags, which made for a more productive day of running. We worked through a range of set-up options with Giancarlo and made some improvements to the car, so in general a useful day.'

Adrian Sutil will round off the test on Wednesday.