SEPTEMBER 11, 2012

Bianchi quickest in Magny Cours young driver test

Force India Friday driver Jules Bianchi spent the opening day of the Magny Cours young driver test on Ferrari duty and topped the times.

The former kart ace did 87 laps aboard the F2012 and lapped in 1m18.070s. That put him half a second clear of GP2 driver Luiz Razia (1:18.535), who was on duty for Force India.

"It was the first time working with Luiz and he impressed us straight away," said chief engineer Jakob Andreasen, after the team had addressed some morning technical gremlins.

Sam Bird drove the Mercedes F1 W03, complete with a new Coanda-style exhaust layout of the type run by several leading F1 teams.

Bird complered 95 laps with a best time of 1:19.094.