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| Bahraini Grand Prix 9th March-12th March 2006 - Friday Practice 1.1 Report |
Length:
5.417 km |
| The 2006 Formula One season got off to more of a whimper than a roaring start with only 17 of the 26 strong field managing to set a time.
The new cars and the sport’s many stars were on display as the weekend got underway with the first practice session in Sakhir for the season opening Bahraini Grand Prix. However it wasn’t the old firm that made the early running but a new outfit in the rebadged BMW Sauber F1. Robert Kubica, the team’s new third driver, was the pacesetter after seeing off numerous challenges from the Cosworth-powered Williams of Alex Wurz. It was a grudge match of sorts with BMW having abandoned Wurz’s Williams squad for the Swiss based Sauber team at the end of last year. Kimi Raikkonen put his McLaren in third with a late run at the flag, ahead of Michael Schumacher of Ferrari. Christian Klien and Neel Jani were next in the order for Red Bull and Squadro Toro Rosso respectively. Juan Pablo Montoya (McLaren), Felipe Massa (Ferrari), and David Coulthard (Red Bull) rounded out the top 10. The times were relatively spread out but it stands as little significance to the reaminder of the weekend with few of the top drivers taking the session seriously. Favourites for victory, Honda, were not even spotted on the track with Rubens Barrichello and Jenson Button preferring the security of the pit wall rather than wasting precious miles on their new V8 engines. The action proper will begin with the afternoon’s hour-long run. A true indication of where the teams stand should then be displayed as another year of F1 swings into action. The new era of V8 engines got off to somewhat of a strong start with no failures or problems recorded in Bahrain’s opening practice run. The same couldn’t be said for Formula One debutantes Super Aguri however who struggled to set a pace on Friday morning. Takuma Sato and Yuji Ide finished 16th and 17th respectively with the session’s slowest times. Robert Kubica was over six seconds quicker than the best effort from the Honda-powered team. |
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