- First Barcelona Test - Day Two
Alonso buoyed by 'beautiful day'
Fernando Alonso is convinced McLaren is on the right path despite a limited day in Barcelona and insists the car feels good when he is able to complete laps.
Alonso accumulated 59 laps on Friday, more than McLaren has managed in one day of testing so far but less than any other team the day. McLaren was restricted again by an MGU-K problem it suffered on Thursday but Alonso is buoyed by what he was able to do.
"Definitely we had a better day today," Alonso said. "We could complete some runs, we started running at 0900 and finished at 1745 which is good news finally. We could test some of the potential of the car finally and complete some laps and check many systems that we could not do before.
"Today has been a beautiful day, driving the car and exploring some of the potential. Obviously we are running with some limitations still on the engine and full power etc, but definitely the car felt better than Jerez. Every lap we do, there is a little thing on the brake balance that we need to fix, there is a little gearshift to improve, there is a temperature that goes too high, too low, so every lap is a learning process and we are enjoying it."
McLaren managed just 79 laps in Jerez earlier this month and Alonso thinks McLaren has raised its game now that it has reached the half-way point of testing.
"I expected, somehow, to have this progress because there are six days between now and end of testing so it's time for us to raise our game and to start doing some laps and learning about the car. That was the aim but yesterday when Jenson had the problem and we had a more difficult day maybe we were a little bit more pessimistic but today finally showed to all of us - to the team, to the guys in the factory in England and Japan - that we are in the right direction.
"The potential of the car is there, with limitations or no limitations the car feels good, it feels quick, so slowly we will put in order some of the issues we have because every lap we do we learn, we fix it, another problem occurs, we fix it. It's the normal thing we went through last year. Our competitors have one year experience and 20 grand prix experience. We don't have that and we will try to make it faster than last year."
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