16/02/2023
NEWS STORY
George Russell joins Fernando Alonso in calling for a fresh approach to pre-season testing.
Next week sees pre-season testing get underway in Bahrain, just one week before the 2023 world championship season kicks off at the same venue.
Hard to believe but as fans look forward to the three days of action (February 23 - 25), not that long ago testing was pretty much a free for all.
Not only was there pre-season testing, there was in-season testing, post-season testing, often with two cars, sometimes teams were even in action at two tracks, there was so much testing teams had dedicated test crews.
However, in a bid to reduce spending and hopefully level the playing field, testing is now reduced to a minimum.
Last year, due to the rules overhaul we got six days of pre-season testing in Barcelona and Bahrain, this year, with few rule changes, it's just three.
Not only does this mean that the reserve and test drivers won't get a look in, it means that just one week before the season opener the likes of Lewis Hamilton et al will have around a day and a half of running... assuming they're lucky and don't suffer any incidents or reliability issues... any red flag stoppages robbing all of precious track time.
Speaking at the launch of the Aston Martin earlier this week, Fernando Alonso was critical of the lack of running.
"It's a little bit unfair," said the Spaniard. "This is the only sport in the world where you do a day and a half of practice, and then you play a world championship."
At the launch of the Mercedes yesterday, George Russell echoed the Spaniard's frustration.
"Personally speaking, I don't think three days is enough," said the Briton. "You've got to remember, from a driver's perspective, that is one and a half days per driver.
"We were fortunate to do the test last week but had we not, that would have been getting on for twelve weeks out of the car from Abu Dhabi to Bahrain," he added. "Could you imagine Rafael Nadal spending twelve weeks without hitting a ball and then going straight into the French Open with one-and-a-half days of training? It would never happen!"
The GPDA (Grand Prix Drivers' Association) director believes that it would make more sense for teams to be allowed to run two cars at the tests, as used to be the case.
"Three days with two cars would be a good place to be," he said, "and that would probably be the best compromise for all of the reasons why they're trying to limit it.
"Right now, one and a half days per driver is too few."