Toyota comes close to victory: a third thief at the fair!

A Toyota en pole, pas nouveau (Trulli déjà, USA 2005 et Ralf Schumacher, Japan 2005)… But the first line?red and white? without bluff left something special. After Brawn and Red Bull, the Japanese team, the third in the gang of broadcasters, finally seemed to have this long-awaited victory.

Even if, in his joy on Saturday evening, President John Howett was not fooled: “A Saturday on the front line is an excellent thing for the morale of the troops who work tirelessly, but the highest step of the podium a late Sunday afternoon is much better! This is what we are aiming for. " Missed. But by a hair.

The two best laps in the race signed by the Trulli-Glock duo demonstrate that, without being in the bag, the matter is looking rather good. Was it necessary to look for this renewed form in the two winter sessions that Toyota carried out last winter on this Sakhir track? Not really, otherwise BMW and Ferrari would have benefited more from it.

“And not even at all,” explains Pascal Vasselon, the technical boss of Toyota F1. The winter tests took place at 30-35°C on the ground, we have 55°C today. It's day and night ! Bahrain in winter allows us to represent a typical European circuit in a normal season. Barcelona for example. The first thing we did for this GP was to forget all the winter data, which we used in Australia and will use elsewhere, and move on as the tires work in a completely different window. The resulting settings are also completely different. »

Find the entire article in AUTOhebdo n°1698, on sale Wednesday April 29…