Horner: Red Bull will sit out the opening test

Source: Horner: Red Bull will sit out the opening test - Planet-F1 News from planet-f1.com

Red Bull Racing will not be present at the first test session of the pre-season, according to team boss Christian Horner.

Red Bull, who finished second in last year's Constructors' Championship having claimed five victories, have revealed that their 2010 challenger, the RB6, will not be ready in time for the Valencia test.

The team will therefore wait until the second test, which takes place at Jerez from February 10-13, before turning a wheel in anger.

"As in 2009, we have elected not to run at the first test with the new car, so we will join at the second test," Horner told Autosport.

The decision to delay the first outing will ensure that the team has more time to conduct wind tunnel tests, even though Horner added that the car is an evolution of last year's RB5.

"It's to optimise the time in the wind tunnel as much as possible," he said. "Obviously the car is much more of an evolution of the 2009 car rather than the clean sheet of regulations that we had for last season.

"But even so, with the refuelling change, we've opted to give our designers as much time as possible."