15/03/2012
NEWS STORY
Mat Coch writes:
Williams drivers Bruno Senna and Pastor Maldonado are confident of a strong year ahead. Regulation changes banning blown diffusers have played in to the team's hands this season, the Grove outfit having never fully exploited the system last year.
"Our disadvantage was the blown diffuser, everybody knows that," admitted Maldonado. "Last year's car wasn't so bad, but we didn't have the blown diffuser and that was a big mistake." With the system now banned the playing field is more equal, and after a solid and reliable pre-season the team's spirits are high.
"The team has made good progress," added Senna. "Everybody has made progress so it's difficult to gauge exactly where we are but I think the midfield battle is going to be very close."
"This car is looking more compact, I have more confidence with the car," agreed Maldonado. "Mechanically it's working better, the aero is working better.
"Everything is looking good; for the team, for myself," the Venezuelan continued. " We had a good pre-season - we ran a lot, a lot of mileage in the car. We haven't had any big problems even though the car has changed a lot from last year."
Boasting a new Renault engine, new electronics, a new structure within the team and a new driver in Bruno Senna, there was a lot of scope for things to go wrong. "My pre-season has been very strong because we've been able to do so many miles," said the Brazilian, echoing the sentiments of his new teammate. "My car has been very reliable and that enabled me to go through almost 100% of the test programme that we were supposed to do."
It's the first time in the Brazilian's career he's had the luxury of a full pre-season build up. In 2010 Hispania never made it to testing, while last year he was reserve driver at Lotus. "It's a very different beginning to everything I've done before in Formula One and I think it's more relaxed than the previous two times," he said. "We come here with as much experience as I could have.
"I think 2010 was a very tough," he continued. "This is really the first chance to be on a straight forward position for people to be able to assess me, and I think if I can show the potential, the strong showings from last year consistently, it could be a good long career."
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