Virgin happy with progress

SO far, so good. But Virgin chief John Booth has admitted that his team are off the pace after the first three races of the F1 season.

The aim is to up their speed, starting next week in Turkey.

The Dinnington team have spent the week working on their upgrade for Istanbul as the Grand Prix circus arrives in Europe, following the openers in Australia, Malaysia and China.

There will be comprehensive changes to the car, chiefly aimed at closing the gap with nearest challengers Lotus, and Team Principal Booth is confident that their target can be achieved.

“We are probably a second and a half off where we wanted to be. It’s a massive gap but, yes, we can close it,” he says.

“We’ve got the major upgrade this week and then another one for Silverstone.

“It’s not going to be easy but it is achievable.

“We haven’t got the resources to do both at once, so we had to get the reliability right first and then up the performance. We have achieved one so now we’re aiming to improve the other.”