Webber satisfied after testing delay

Mark Webber shrugged off the frustrations of a three-hour delay to the start of his season after Red Bull fought a losing battle with Mother Nature.

The delivery of the rear-wing assembly, initially delayed due to an inspection following yesterday’s online launch, was diverted to Seville this morning due to fog at Jerez airport.

That left Webber kicking his heels while 10 other teams – Marussia are the only absentees – started their pre-season in earnest at the Circuito de Jerez in southern Spain.

Despite that, Webber said: “We cut it a little bit fine because we were beaten by the fog, but we had a reasonable recovery and did 53 laps.

“Obviously, it’s never part of the plan to give up three hours. We’re an incredibly well-organised team, very well prepared, so what happened is something very unusual for us.

“Sometimes we can’t control Mother Nature. We risked it a bit tight on the schedule and we paid a bit of a price, which can happen sometimes. But after that the car went very well. Hopefully we will have a better day tomorrow.”

Webber finished fourth overall, just under a second slower than the returning Kimi Raikkonen for Lotus, in a car very different to last year.

Sporting the new stepped nose to cater for front-wing ride-height regulations and with the car no longer possessing their defining blown diffuser, Webber still declared himself “satisfied”.

“It is different for sure,” said Webber. “In terms of the way the blown diffuser worked, it was powerful in terms of the car’s balance.

“But we knew that was coming and so have worked hard to address this new aerodynamic package. It is different, but still nice.

“As for the nose, I’m not a big fan. In terms of the regulations a lot of teams have gone that way. Formula One cars should look beautiful, and generally they do. I still think ours looks nice. Adrian [Newey] always builds beautiful cars.

“The stepped nose is not really desirable for the modelling of the car, but that’s how it is. It works okay.”