It is Barcelona instead of Bahrain for Final Pre Season Test

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The Final test of the pre-season will take place at the Barcelona circuit following the cancellation of the Bahrain Grand Prix.

Bahrain was scheduled to host the test from the start of next week, but with the news that the Sakhir event has been withdrawn, teams have decided to do all their winter testing in Spain.

The Barcelona test will take place on March 8-11, some two weeks before the start of the season in Australia.

The decision means the teams are likely to be unable to test Pirelli's tyres in hot conditions before they travel to Melbourne.

"To be honest it's a big pity for us," said Toro Rosso driver Jaime Alguersuari. "I think it should be a big pity for everyone. It's a really good example to see how these tyres work in different temperatures, hotter, different humidity levels. It's really crucial for us if we don't do that test.

"I would rather prefer to do the test there after this test to keep our training period in Spain because at the end you always find the same kind of temperatures and humidity here. I wanted to see different situations and circumstances on the tyres."




Possibility of moving Final F1 Test Date

The final pre-season test at Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya could be moved to a later date, according to a report.

With the start of the F1 season has moved to March 27 in Melbourne, teams will have a big gap between the final test and the Australian Grand Prix as things stand.

However, according to Adam Cooper's F1 Blog 'FOTA is considering a plan to move the extra Barcelona test from March 8-11 to March 10-13, and is canvassing the teams today.

'The original date emerged yesterday, after it became clear that Bahrain wasn't going ahead. The new date would exactly mirror that of the Bahrain GP weekend, and ending on a Saturday/Sunday, would guarantee the track a bumper crowd.

'Either way the teams will travel back to their home bases in order to prepare the cars for shipping to Melbourne. It seems that some teams would prefer to have two extra days of 'factory time' for R&D and production of new parts before the test, rather than after it.'