Formula 1 News

Toro Rosso confirm STR3 debut in Monaco 

The Scuderia Toro Rosso had planned originally to introduce its 2008 challenger car, the STR3 at the fifth round of the Formula 1 World Championship, the Turkish Grand Prix. However, STR2B has been given a stay of execution and will have its last race in Istanbul.

Laurent Mekies, Toro Rosso’s Chief Engineer explained: “Everyone in the company has worked really hard to try and meet the deadline of running the new car in Turkey, but we had to make the tough call of delaying the arrival of STR3 by one more race. The main reason is that we do not feel we have enough spare parts to run the new cars in a totally professional manner.”

“As one can imagine, given the unique nature of the Monaco track and the working conditions at the circuit, this is not an ideal venue to run a new car for the first time,” continued Mekies. “However, everyone is prepared to face the challenge and give it our best shot.”

Meanwhile, the Faenza based team is equally keen to give the old car a good send off at the technically demanding Istanbul Park circuit.

“This will be the first time for Sebastien Bourdais on this track so we have tried to work as much as we could off-track to get him to the right level of preparation for the coming race,” added Mekies. “In any case, so far this year, he has shown that he can adapt pretty quickly to a new track. ”

“Sebastian Vettel was already driving for us in Turkey last year: it was his second race with the team and he performed well there. This weekend, we will try and put together all our knowledge about the STR2B for this challenging track, which is one of the few where you can actually overtake other cars! Hopefully we will have some good racing in Istanbul, so that we can end this car’s career in style!”

source: Toro Rosso