More, the 2-time world champion warned that not only the rear tires, but also the front ones have presented similar levels of degradation, but admitted that some portions of the Spanish circuit are harder on the tires than what he’d encountered so far in the first two group tests.
“To be honest, it's not a big difference compared with what we found at Jerez and Valencia,” said Alonso when asked about the behavior of the new Pirelli tires in Barcelona. “The tires are still degrading a lot on the long runs, maybe here it's not only the rear tires but also the left front.”
“It's very demanding [for the left front] here at Barcelona on Turn 3, Turn 4 and Turn 9, so it's a little bit more than normal, but the degradation is something that we already saw at Jerez and Valencia, no big difference here.”
The Spaniard finished the Saturday running on the Spanish circuit 3rd in the timing reports, but experienced his first reliability problems with the Ferrari F150th Italia. Despite suffering both electrical and mechanical issues throughout the day, the car was still good for some 90 laps around the Circuit de Catalunya.
"One of the mechanics said to me that when things go well in Barcelona, we don’t win the championship, while if we have problems here, then it’s a different story: let’s hope that’s really the case!" he joked.
“Today is the first day we've had some mechanical issues, but it's not too worrying. We are putting a lot of mileage on the car. Everything is working well,” insisted Alonso, who once again insisted that the true worth of his Ferrari will be seen after the first few races of 2011.
Google News