- First Bahrain Test - Day Two
Mercedes still exceeding expectations - Rosberg
Mercedes has started to focus on performance and set-up work in Bahrain after exceeding its own expectations in terms of reliability, according to Nico Rosberg.
The car stopped twice on track with two different problems during the second day of testing in Bahrain, but while some of its rivals are simply trying to put mileage on their cars, Rosberg said Mercedes is still happy with the reliability of its car.
"The first part of testing was for reliability and that was very important, I think we did a decent job on that," he said. "We were getting a lot of laps done and trying to understand where our weaknesses are on the car and where we have to work on.
"Then performance is obviously the most important and we don't really know where we are yet with performance. We've started work on the set-up, and today, from that point of view, was a good day for me because I felt at home, felt comfortable and was able to attack. That was a nice feeling."
Rosberg said the Mercedes' reliability was allowing the team to be flexible with its run plans while other teams continue to slave away on fixing problems.
"We're better than we expected to be in terms of reliability, just compared to our own expectations. We thought it would be even more difficult, so from that point of view we're pleased because everybody has done a good job to make this car relatively reliable to start off with. [It's] reliable in a way that at least we can do a lot of laps and start to see problems and also work on performance."
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