Sauber admitted they were working on a qualifying setup when Kamui Kobayashi set the fastest lap of the week on the final day of the second test.
Kobayashi sets fastest time of week as team look for one-lap pace
Sauber admitted they were working on a qualifying setup when Kamui Kobayashi
set the fastest lap of the week on the final day of the second test in Barcelona.
The Swiss team struggled in qualifying last season with Kobayashi's seventh place at his home event in Japan as good as it got - and even that was only because Michael Schumacher and both Renaults opted not to set a team in the third part of qualifying.
Head of Track Engineering Giampaolo Dall'Ara admitted the team needed to improve their performances on a Saturday and get into qualifying three more regularly, so had focused on that on Friday.
Dall'Ara said: "It was another positive test day for us. We started in the morning with some further aero comparisons and set-up work.
"Before lunch Kamui did qualifying runs. Qualifying was actually a weakness of ours in the last two seasons and we have to resolve this. This obviously requires proper practice. Kamui started with the medium compound before he used two sets of soft tyres, and in the end he got his first taste of the 2012 super soft compound.
"He did his fastest lap on the second set of softs. This lap time now stands as the overall fastest for this week, but of course this doesn't mean much because proper comparisons are never possible during testing with each team running different programmes. In the afternoon we did longer runs for race preparation."
Positive
Tyre warm-up was also a problem for Sauber last year and Kobayashi felt the team made good progress after experimenting with the various compounds on the final day at Barcelona
The Japanese driver added: "I'm quite happy. We achieved a very good mileage today. The set up changes we did in the morning meant an improvement in lap times, which, of course, is very positive.
"There is still a lot of work to do in terms of understanding the car and the different tyre compounds at different fuel levels, but we are working in the right direction. I think it was a good test for us."
