“It was an absolute no-brainer for [Sebastian and I] to be here,”
the Australian said. “There was never any consideration that the race
drivers wouldn’t come to this test.
“Mileage is so limited these days that’s its good for me to be in the car. Any
chance we get to drive the car in the real world, we’ll do it.”
Jenson Button, who has been in Budapest this week for sponsors Vodafone, said
following last month’s Bahrain Grand Prix that he agreed with McLaren’s
decision.
“The reason why we’re not there is because we’ve never been to Mugello
before,” Button said. “I don’t really think we will be a benefit because
there aren’t any massive updates to try.
“For the test drivers to put some miles on parts and try some very
extreme things, then I think it’s good, but it’s not necessary for us to be
there.”
Webber, though, said that while the track was different to most of the
circuits which make up the F1 calendar, it was still good practice and the
team would be able to log some useful data.
“There are parts of the lap that we don’t really race on these days,” he
said. “The very, very fast stuff is not how we race on the modern tracks
these days.
“But there is still information that we can take to other venues, particularly
from an aerodynamic point of view.”
The Australian added that he did not expect any major upgrades to be bolted on
to the RB8 before next week’s Spanish Grand Prix.
“I don’t think so,” he said. “I think that there will be small
details. As far as I know, we’ll have some things but I don’t think it will
be drastic.”
Lotus’ Romain Grosjean and Sauber’s Kamui Kobayashi topped the time sheets on
a brighter day at Mugello on Wednesday following Tuesday’s near washout.
Vettel and Webber were next fastest, completing 64 and 54 laps respectively.
Paffett managed 59 laps before his day was brought to a premature end by a
gearbox failure. McLaren said the team were nevertheless able to
“conduct some positive tests, mainly focusing on improvements to aero
correlation and broadening our understanding of tyre temperature and
behaviour.”
Turvey returns to the cockpit for the third and final day on Thursday.