MAY 27, 1996

Hill fastest at Silverstone

THE top F1 teams were testing last week at Silverstone, although bad weather in England made life difficult.

THE top F1 teams were testing last week at Silverstone, although bad weather in England made life difficult. The Williams team completed over 200 laps of the Northamptonshire track with Damon Hill setting the fastest time of the three-day test with a lap of 1m27.24s. He lost half a day of running because of a Renault engine failure. Jacques Villeneuve was second fastest with a best of 1m27.90s after completing an impressive 130 laps.

McLaren was flat out again with David Coulthard running on all three days and completing a mammoth 179 laps as he race tested the latest version of the Mercedes V10 engine. His best was a 1m28.44s. The Scotsman was joined on the final day of the test by Mika Hakkinen who did 27 laps with a best of 1m28.96s. The team is planning to be at Idi Ada in Spain for three days this week.

Benetton had another troubled test with Gerhard Berger and Jean Alesi completing just 61 laps between them over the three days. Alesi was trying a revised rear suspension in an effort to solve the problem which forced his retirement at Monaco, but the new system failed. Alesi's best was 1m28.77s while Berger did no better than 1m29.62s.

Jordan ran two of the three days with Rubens Barrichello completing 50 laps with a best lap of 1m29.68s and MartinÊBrundle completing 75 laps with a best of 1m29.86s.

Tyrrell and Arrows arrived for the final day of the test with Tyrrell tester Emmanuel Collard completing 33 laps for a best time of 1m29.97s, and Jos Verstappen doing 14 laps to get down to a 1m30.93s.

Ferrari was in action in Italy and Sauber at Jerez in Spain.