Gabriel Bortoleto feels that Audi have “a lot of learnings” to take from the opening day of the Barcelona Shakedown, with the squad experiencing a shorter stint on track after spotting an issue on their car.
The new team – formerly the Kick Sauber outfit – were amongst those to gain some early mileage on Day 1 of the event, but Bortoleto admitted that Monday brought with it mixed fortunes, having experienced a “decent” morning before their running was limited later on.
“It was, I would say, a bit of a short day,” the Brazilian reflected. “We were doing a pretty decent job in the morning, putting some laps on board, testing some things. We were going in the right direction.
“But as we all expected, it is a shakedown – everything can happen, and we expect to find issues here and there in the car. We found a couple of problems that unfortunately put us out of the day from the morning, so I didn’t run much today. But it was expected, these types of thing – we are finding everything now to hopefully not find it in the next test or in the first race of the year.
“But overall, I would say when we were running positive [it was] good to have a feel with the new car, the new regulations, power unit and everything. Hopefully on the next day I’m driving I can get a few more laps onboard.”
Pushed on whether there were still learnings from the mileage he did complete, Bortoleto responded: “I think there were a lot of learnings from the laps I completed, to understand a little bit the power unit, the car, give feedback to the team where we need to improve because there are a lot of things we have to do better.
“We are a new team as well, building for the first time our own power unit, so there are a lot of places we need to do a step here and there, but I’m very excited for that. It’s been incredible being part of this new journey for me.
“Regarding the stoppage on track today, it was a precaution thing as well and we decided to not run until we fully understand, and then to put the car back on track and have a clear run.”
Team Principal Jonathan Wheatley echoed Bortoleto’s excitement about bringing the Audi project to life, saying of the team’s start on Monday: “First of all it feels fantastic to be here wearing the Audi Four Rings, being the Audi Revolut Formula 1 team instead of a project that we’ve been talking about or the future team.
“Just standing here, this whole new garage infrastructure – what this team’s achieved in such a short period of time – new pit wall, new pit equipment, new pit stop gantry. Look at the trucks – everything screams Audi now. And for us today to see the car on the track, in its livery in all its glory, it’s a pinch yourself moment.”
Sharing further details on the issues experienced with the R26, Wheatley explained: “We had a technical issue with the car – we spotted it, decided to switch the car off on track.
“We’ve got plenty of testing this year and we wanted to really understand the problems and we’ve been carefully analysing that. We’re just getting the car prepped and ready, and we’ll see what the weather conditions are for tomorrow to see whether tomorrow’s a day we’ll run.”
As teams are permitted to run on three days across the five-day Barcelona Shakedown, Wheatley admits that the weather could prove all-important in deciding the run plan over the coming days.
“I think it’s interesting because you talk about the run plan, all the teams are facing the same decision,” he conceded. “Firstly, have you got the right spare parts to be able to support running, then what’s the weather condition like.
“I’ve been talking to other team principals – nobody wants to let the cat out of the bag. I don’t either! But it’s been very interesting that you have this strategy to make every day about when you run.”
