Midland a busy team up to March

Likey to be busy too
By Huw Alban
January 5 2006

A few days ago a kind soul at Sportmotores.com gave us a series of dates that were claimed to be "Tiago's" test dates. Given that we have just been in conversation with Midland about Tiago's future with the team we thought we'd check the dates out.

The dates, as given to us were:

January

Silverstone 19-20

February

Silverstone 3
Jerez 7-9-10
Valencia 14-15-16-17
Barcelona 21-23
Silverstone 27-28

It has come to our attention today that these dates were made public in Autosport recently, but it is unclear as to whether Autosport made the same claim over them being Tiago Monteiro specific.

It is our understanding that the January test dates will be a private test at Silverstone, and likely to be the first shakedown of the Toyota V8 married up to the new Midland gearbox. It is also possible that this test may take place over more days than the two given above and will almost certainly be using an EJ15B.

We have been advised by our sources at Midland that the dates supplied by Sportmotores.com are "fairly accurate although still subject to change".

On the subject of whose driving at these tests the team were understandably vague. "Christijan (Albers), of course, will be driving as will two drivers to be confirmed later," we have been advised.

It would appear that by the beginning of February we will not only know the identity of the second race driver, but also the name of the test and development driver also.

If we hear more on the testing front then we'll let you know.