Formula One news

Williams happy with 2,800km first test for FW27

The Williams BMW FW27 made its track debut at the Valencia circuit this week for a four day test following its launch on Monday. Nick Heidfeld joined Mark Webber for the duration of the test, following the announcement that the German will partner Mark for the forthcoming season.

The BMW WilliamsF1 Team drivers completed 722 laps of the Valencia circuit over the four days, a total of 2,888 kilometers. Having driven 378 laps, Nick covered the highest mileage of any driver over the week. The duo will continue the team's test programme next week with a four day test at Jerez commencing on Tuesday.

"It's always good to get the first test of a new car underway to learn how the set-up works," explained Williams technical director Sam Michael. "Nick and Mark shared testing duties, checking systems, heat rejection, brake cooling and many other items that are necessary to benchmark with a totally new car. There was also plenty of tyre testing to do with Michelin. There were no major reliability problems with the FW27 and, as such, the daily mileage the drivers recorded was high. There is a lot of development work to do before Melbourne to ensure that we are in a competitive position and I've no doubt that 2005 will be a long, hard battle for the Championship with competition from all the teams."

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