Ross Brawn has made it pretty clear that he aims to win in Bahrain. The Mercedes team principal told the official F1 website that his target is always to win the next race, and the next race happens to be Bahrain.
“Our objective is to start [winning] in Bahrain. Once we see where everybody is, we’ll see what sort of task that we have to carry out and how we need to react. Our target is always to win the next race. And the next race is Bahrain.”
Brawn admitted the car wasn’t quite where the team had hoped, pace wise, but he hoped the updated package, to be introduced at the first race in Bahrain will push the team towards the top of the timesheets.
“We are not quite as well prepared as I would like to be,” said Brawn, “but we are getting there. It’s been quite a difficult winter.
“I think as it was the first winter with 450 people, as opposed to 700, we’ve felt the loss in a few areas. But I’m reasonably happy with the car. It’s showing good promise.”
When asked whether reports that the car was around a second off the pace of Ferrari and McLaren, Brawn replied: “I don’t think that it is a second.
“You have to look into the details of what has been done. I think that on our high fuel runs and our race runs, when we get the car right, we are competitive. It’s just a little tricky to get the car right. Michael hasn’t carried out a proper low-fuel qualifying run, but Nico (Rosberg) had a go with lower fuel and it was definitely not bad. He ended the third test day with the best overall time. So I don’t think that we are a second away.
“We have an update for Bahrain. We decided not to bring it to Barcelona but leave it until the last moment. We’ve learnt to assess and run pieces without testing them. It’s crucial when you have seasons without testing, as you have to bring upgrades to races during the year. In Barcelona we had little bits and pieces, but the major upgrade will be introduced in Bahrain.”
