1st Day Testing

After a bright, cold and windy start this morning we welcomed the
Formula 1 circus with World Constructor Champions Ferrari and World Drivers Champion Vodafone Mercedes McLaren.

Formula One made its official testing debut at the Autodromo Internacional do Algarve in Portugal, where Ferrari and McLaren kicked off their final test of the year.

The day, however, was affected by very strong winds which hampered the teams' progress.

This gave me and Richard who lives in Alvor, whom I met on my arrival a chance to walk the whole perimeter of the track and get a real feel of this prestigeous new raceway. We both did better than the Brazilian Felipe Massa who only managed 36 laps before he had to end the test ahead of schedule because he was feeling unwell. His best time was 1:32.926

The other only driver on track today was McLaren's tester Gary Paffett, who covered 63 laps with a best time of 1:31.788. The Briton was using the MP4-23 fitted with the 2009 front wing the team introduced last week at Jerez.

The track is very exciting with lots of hills, twists and turns to keep everyone on their toes and with both teams continue working at Algarve tomorrow it hopefully will attract more spectators.