In addition, the Scuderia continued working on engine and gearbox reliability. Apart from a small electrical problem on the F60 in the morning session – that forced Massa to stop near the track – the yesterday testing went as planend. Massa clocked the best time of 1.32.162 during an overall 112 laps.
“Today was a good day, apart from some minor problems, which held us up a bit. We have to work on that to avoid that they come back. And the strong wind bothered us a bit. We drove many kilometres to improve the car and I think that we're heading in the right direction. It was a pity that we lost almost two entire days her last week because of the sandstorm. But I think that all in all we were able to make up the lost time,” said Massa after the last day of testing.
Second overall was BMW Sauber's Nick Heidfeld, who stopped the clock at 1.32.225 after 122 laps on the Sakhir circuit. Toyota's Timo Glock was at the bottom of the timing sheet on Thursday, scoring the best time of 1:32.445. However, he only got to test for an overall 65 laps, as the Toyota TF109 has encountered some problems on the hydraulic system earlier in the morning. It was Toyota's only reliability problem with their 2009 challenger this week.
“It was a pity that our last day of work here was disrupted but this has still been a very successful test for us. Today we missed much of the day's action due to a hydraulics problem so it was a shame to lose running time. But the mechanics did a good job and when we made it onto the track we put in some useful work. Overall we have put a lot of miles on the TF109 this week. We've made good progress with set-up and I'm confident that this can continue,” said Glock.
The next group test in preparation for the upcoming F1 season is Jerez, starting March 1st.
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