Bridgestone have declared themselves happy with the progress they have made as the 2006 season officially drew to a close at Jerez with a number of teams continuing to get to grips with the their new rubber ahead of 2007.

Indeed, with six teams switching from Michelin to Bridgestone for next year, the race is on between Renault, McLaren, Honda, BMW, Red Bull and Toro Rosso to get to understand their Potenza tyres sufficiently before the start of the season in order to neutralise the natural advantage existing squads Ferrari, Toyota, Williams, Spyker and Super Aguri already have.

Nonetheless, with Bridgestone producing new tyres to aid the new teams' cause, Hisao Suganuma was content that the teams are now beginning to understand the unfamiliar rubber and their specific characteristics.

“Our initial impressions of the first three winter tests are very positive and I would like to thank the teams for their co-operation and hard work in their efforts to learn about the new Bridgestone Potenza tyres.

“These tyres use a new construction and new compounds so all the teams have had to start from the beginning. They have had to consider how to exploit the optimum operating window of the tyre by adjusting their car set-ups and looking at factors such as camber, toe, weight distribution and tyre pressures.

“Initially some teams experienced some rear tyre degradation but as the weeks progressed and as the Jerez circuit improved in grip levels over these past two weeks, we saw that the teams improved their car balance and they were able to set some good, consistent lap times.

“Of course, track and ambient temperatures are not that high during winter testing in Europe so our next step is to corroborate these results. Overall, we are very pleased that we have been able to provide a consistent tyre whose wide operating window has enabled all the teams to use it.”

One of the teams that are learning the new Bridgestone tyres, McLaren have working hard to build their new car round the tyres, with Martin Whitmarsh confident they have made strong progress.

“During the last three weeks of testing our biggest priority has been to evaluate the 2007 Bridgestone Potenza tyres, understanding them and adapting the MP4-21 chassis to best exploit them. Anything we can learn at this stage will give us important knowledge in the development direction of next year's MP4-22 ahead of its launch. In this time we have made a great deal of progress in adapting the car to the new tyres.

Initial feedback suggests that the Bridgestone Potenza tyres play to our strengths in both aerodynamic and chassis departments. We feel we have made significant gains in finding grip and balance from the tyres, and also controlling the wear and degradation.”