Toyota technical director Pascal Vasselon has said that his team s intention of testing in Bahrain next week will be a wiser choice than testing at Jerez. The Cologne-based team is to join Ferrari and BMW in testing in Bahrain, whereas McLaren, Renault, Williams and Red Bull will test in southern Spain.
Rain marred the Portimao test last month, and Vasselon told autosport.com that the possibility of further inclement weather in Europe could damage the teams development process.
There is a risk in Europe in the winter of spending your time in conditions that are totally irrelevant in terms of the tyre working window. And this can put in doubt any kind of set-up result you get, because the tyres are not working in the right window.
All of the couplings between the tyres and the other set-up parameters can be totally wrong. This can cost a lot in terms of pre-season preparation.
Southern Spain is enduring one of the coldest and wettest winters in living memory and with track time limited, teams are eager to evaluate dry weather performance. Williams technical director Sam Michael defended the decision to test at Jerez, however, on the grounds of cost.
“We’ve never gone to Bahrain testing because the delta between staying in Europe and going out there is well over £300,000, so it’s not really conducive to saving costs, the Australian told autosport.com.
