The speed of the Brawn-Mercedes has taken everyone by surprise and while there may be a certain amount of showmanship involved, it is clear that the car is good and may even be good enough to race for victories. The lap times being produced have been impressive and while some are wondering how this has been achieved given the late arrival of the car and the change of engine. The reality is that the work on the new car began very early on last year because the team was aware that its car at the time was not very competitive and wasting too much energy on that was not logical. The team thus spent a huge amount of time analysing the new rules and working in the wind tunnels at Brackley.
McLaren on the other hand seems to be struggling, but the team says that the problem that has been causing its slow times has been identified and can be fixed before the first race.
"Our focus has been on reliability and achieving as much mileage as possible," said Ross Brawn. "That the car has run so reliably 'out of the box' is a tribute to the strong team that we have at our factory in Brackley and they have done a great job during a very difficult period. The car is performing to our expectations and the feedback from Jenson and Rubens has been positive with both drivers completing full race distances. We have three further days of testing in Jerez next week to complete our preparations for the first race and I look forward to seeing how the car progresses from here."


source[www.grandprix.com]