That was from the 5th driver

Whoever he is...?

whenever teams say 'disciplined' during testing, that is ronspeak/motorsport speak for no low fuel runs right?

Yes there is an implication of 'holding back'. I hope.

im very interested in this news

no, same old as before

It means they are adhering to a pre planned program; not going for fast times just to make the headlines.
I would expect all the teams to be taking this approach however seeing that this is the first opportunity of track testing new components...

I have a feeling that we are around 0.5 secs off the pace of the fastest team though. Hopefully I am wrong. If we are half a second off the best with bigger steps yet to come shortly, then it aint so bad.

I think 0.5 is a best case scenario around this track. It was nearly that much in Bahrain, and that was a good circuit for the car. If other teams have brought along more updates than McLaren, at a circuit which already it isn't suited to, then it could be a much bigger gap.

I'm just hoping for some points really, but hopefully there'll be a pleasant surprise somewhere.

Agreed. Scoring points will have to do for now with a late surge toward the front of the grid later in the season.*

*I'm an optimist.

agreed, im quessing 0.8 - ...

news from germany.mclaren will run new diffusor in the afternoon.

we will see.

With Hamiltons race pace he could get that down to 0.5-0.6 a lap defict. Plus this years Mclaren is much better in race trim than qualifying trim.

im not sure, i have a feeling we will seriously suffer this weekend, and qual is everything on this track

Source?

have the same feeling...we'll go backwards this race i fear

if they did run a new diffuser, it made no difference

Source

the centre of the new diffusor is different.pics will follow

Naked: http://premium.f1-live.com/f1/photos-hires...a/diapo_663.jpg

Oh dear. Hamilton sounds rather dejected. Nothing working. No progress in the fast corners. I doubt they will get out of Q1 this weekend which is somewhat disappointing. I'm surprised that the team have not made real inroads into the cars fundemental failings by now.

Doesn't look as though the sidepods can shrink any further, no space at all. I think we will struggle on sunday, but if lewis can drive the way he has been and bag as 2-3 points and we can stay fourth in the constructors im happy.

Kov. FP2.





http://img12.imageshack.us/img12/1141/dddmcl.jpg

<straw clutching> Just wondering if they might be fitting the contents of the 'big brown box' that arrived today overnight.

After all a big brown box must be better than a small one

</straw clutching>

Good lord. Hide all sharp objects from Lewis.

It really isn't good if they've brought some upgrades and they've done nothing, as Lewis is saying...especially if the progress here at Barcelona, since the test here, is as small as he's saying. Really bad, in fact. Considering the car has been constantly developed since then.

Could be a pretty depressing race on Sunday. Slash season.

Yep. This race is going to hurt by the looks of it.

The team had prepared the drivers and fans for this but apparently poorness came as a shock, even to LH.

yep you were right, new diff for sure

very well packed, and it is very clear that housing KERS unit is preventing them from sculpting underside of sidepod. it's difficult task to further shape up the body unless KERS become smaller.

Looks like 2004 all over again. Bring the MP4/24B now!

We are slow on this track. Even to get to Q2 might be a tough work. We shall be happy even if we'll get 1 point.

Longer stints from HK showed a similar pace to the BMW of RK.

BMW notoriously go heavy in FP2, and I suspect Mclaren have done the same here. The run down to the first corner is long enough that with their KERS Mclaren should be able to make up a few positions.

I'm expecting one Mclaren through to Q3, and the other just missing out of the top ten... The midfield is so tight that anything is possible...

It's interesting that although Lewis says the car hasn't improved at all, Heikki says he liked the improvements and MW says they think they can get into Q3 tomorrow.

Isn't it the case that HK wasnt happy with the new wing at the last couple of races, but LH was? It's possible that HK would therefore see more of a jump with the latest updates.

is it possible that only one car, in this case kova, uses the new parts and the other one not, in this case LH? it makes sense to compare the new parts to the older ones. an argument against this theory is the slow lap time of kova. we will see tomorrow.

It seems Lewis expected more. I still can't find a proper size picture about the FP2 diffuser.

Switching his focus to the new floor – which features a double-diffuser for the first time this season

Hey, Diffuser of Justice has arrived today!

Also FW4, a new front wing. The endplates are different.

So the team have made big efforts yet again, but this time the result is not as good as expected.

If we use Norb as a fairly constant source that quite a few regard as fairly reliable, he doesn't sound as downbeat as we're perhaps used to.

He says "Our laptimes during our race simulation in the afternoon looked better than two months ago at the final winter test. The positive is this proves that we are working in the right direction;" so there's perhaps more improvement than Lewis really mentioned, although he notes "he negative is that we are still not quick enough to fight for podium finishes – in fact, it will be tough to enter Q3 tomorrow and to start the race in the Top 10."

So really, the team moves back to around Malaysia territory in the pecking order?

The car apparently has rear wheel hubs now too, not sure if thats been mentioned.

What Haug says is still sour grapes for me. In that test McLaren was 2.5-3 seconds off the pace, to move from there to the right direction is not equal with catching up as much as they planned.

Yes, they have made huge efforts since then, and most of them worked, we'll see tomorrow how the newest ones will work.

Looks horrible, Lewis had a total of one lap under 1.23s

Do I have to say it again? Lots of contradictions - it's so typical for McLaren since 2007 at least.

Anyway, Spain seems to be the toughest weekend so far for McLaren.

Mclaren's free practise analyse

No problem with the front bodywork.
http://premium.f1-live.com/f1/photos-hires...a/diapo_090.jpg

I'd sure as hell hope that the car is better than it was 2 months ago...

They aren't competiting with themselves, they are competing against others. Everybody constantly improves. Its how much you improve in relation to your competition that matters.

Well no shit, but if you look at what Lewis said, "yes there has been a little bit of progress for sure. It is not as bad as it was at that time, but it is still a long way away," (and that the new package was a hunk of junk basically). My point was that Norbert, usually oh so down, didn't seem so defeated. He talks about challenging for Q3, this is an improvement over the field from being 2.5 seconds down, is it not?

Not where the team should be, agreed, but it's all relative right now.

Why are you telling me 'no shit'? You should be telling Haug that cuz being better than you were 2 months prior isn't something to brag about. Its all about improving relative to the competition. If they are going backwards in the field, then regardless of whether he seems defeated or not, there is not much you can say positive about it.

I dont see how you can be comforted by such a 'no shit' statement. That said, if Heikki definitely feels the improvements, then its not completely impossible for Lewis to try and find what Heikki has. They seem to have a decent relationship and can probably work on it. Thats something positive to take away from it.

Well I just felt like it really, and I don't have Norb's contact details.

And, as I said, they ARE improving relative to the field. Clearly. 2.5 seconds behind the leader then. Probably just less than a second behind the leaders now. It might not be stratospheric improvement, but improvement nonetheless, and relative to the competition, as you are insisting.

You can't really compare this race to Bahrain either. Different types of track, as has been discussed, one flattering of the MP4-24, one quite evil to it.

well if kova goes into Q3 then we know we have made HUGE improvements lol

EDIT

Thank you for the brilliant work of the journalists of not getting us decent pics of the new diff. Good work ......NOT

I think this is it, the McDDD-1:

I am sure that most people have noticed the obvious spit in the team over conclusions and attitude within the team.
This showed to me a difference in the internal dynamics of the team since Ron has left. Robert and LH are aligned against Kova and Martin, more precisely, LH is aligned with Mercedes, Kova and Martin are aligned with Mclaren!

I have the feeling that LH is looking to get into one of the Brawn (Mercedes) cars and doesn't really care much for Mclaren, he has not displayed enough sensitivity to the morale of the guys behind the scene at Wokin. A driver could be critical of the equipment and yet present his views in a less "distructive" language in public. LH is never going to be an effective team leader. Mclaren should get the car up to speed and get Vetel in at the latest opportunity who I am sure will out perform Mr. LH.

I hope that the car can get into Q3 today and if that happens, it will be interesting to see Mr. LH's reaction.
One more thing, I really hope that Martin is up to the job, I hope he has some steel in his spine otherwise, we might be witnessing the begining of the decline of Mclaren as a top F1 team.

So sad...

You read into it too much.

Kovalainen feels some improvements because he switched from FW2 to FW4. He started to use double-decker front wing just now. Lewis uses it since Shanghai. Lewis switched from FW3. Between FW3 and FW4 there's no too much difference, both are double-decker; "FW4 – essentially a finessed version of the previous front-wing iteration, first raced in Shanghai".

So Lewis can focus on the new DDD excluding the FW from the improvement. He didn't find the DDD a noticeable improvement on the first time, compared to the former pimped up diffuser. The results are backing his opinion. It might change today, after analysing the data and finding the right setup for it.

Norbert Haug seems to me a very friendly and kind (and also a rational) man and he seems to be much closer to Lewis than Ron and Martin was, since 2007.

I think you need your head checked.

I would as most people listen to a differenced of opinion but a response like yours surely must come from somebody of low esteem hiding behind veil of anonymity to pour out insults.

You are the first on my ignore list, bye.

what a load of BS!