Following its run with IndyCar star Juan Pablo Montoya, Porsche continues to hand new drivers a chance to try out its FIA WEC Championship-winning 919, for a two-day test at Barcelona.
This time round saw McLaren F1 reserve driver (though soon to be on the open market) Kevin Magnussen, 2014 LMP2 Le Mans winner Oliver Turvey and current GP2 star Mitch Evans take the wheel of the hybrid P1 machine.
While Porsche are not providing any more information as to whether the trio have a shot at a seat going forward- notably Nico Hulkenburg’s vacant in its third car for Le Mans, it’s good to see some young drivers taking a peek at what the WEC’s elite has to offer.
Magnussen was full of praise after his run, the young Dane seemingly very impressed by the technology packed into the car.
“The Porsche 919 Hybrid is the first race car I have driven for months,” he said. “It’s an amazing car with amazing power. It is easy to feel that this is probably the most advanced race car in the world at the moment.”
He did though cite the challenges that driving a closed-top prototype for the first time can bring.
“I have a few things to work on,” he admitted. “Especially getting on top of braking. As you can’t see the front wheels here, you don’t really know when you’re locking up, so that is something to get used to and there is also a lot less visibility compared to a single seater.”
Turvey and Evans were similarly impressed by the car, which to them wasn’t quite as much of a culture shock after spending extensive time in the LMP2 class recently for Jota Sport.
“We are a young team with a highly complex race car,” Porsche team principal Andreas Seidel said. “For us it is always exciting and informative when drivers share their first experiences with the 919 Hybrid. The feedback is sometimes very detailed and individual.
“We regularly scan various motorsport categories for strong drivers, inside and outside the Porsche family. We are really pleased our test programme has allowed us to invite these three drivers to Barcelona. Before this, they visited Weissach in October to prepare for this.”
