Nick Wirth was delighted with the downforce levels produced by the two Virgin Racing cars on Friday as the team prepares for its first ever home Grand Prix this weekend. With second practice having signalled the end of the on-track action today, Lucas di Grassi and Timo Glock finished 20th and 21st quickest.
Virgin is the only team in the pit lane to use CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) technology for aerodynamics, as opposed to a wind tunnel – something for which a number of fans and F1 insiders alike wrote off the Sheffield squad’s chances even before the season began - although Technical Director Wirth is thrilled with the progress being made.
“A fascinating and encouraging day,” he said on Friday evening. “We did a series of aero tests today that have proved conclusively that we’ve made the expected step forwards in downforce, which is consistent with our digital aero process; in fact the step is so significant that it caused a number of setup issues that we’re trying to address.
“Lucas had a steady and productive day, with the setup direction evolving as he’d found on the simulators this week, which is great news. Timo had a tricky Friday, starting with a fuel leak caused by a pinched o-ring delaying his start and a lengthy setup change taking up some valuable track time later on.”
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