Jimmy Eriksson completes Jerez GP2 test

Jimmy Eriksson completed three partly promising, partly frustrating days of GP2 testing at Circuito de Jerez in southern Spain this week.

The Swede once again joined forces with Arden International to continue the work commenced in Barcelona three weeks ago, and was left upbeat by a couple of highly competitive race simulation runs on Wednesday and Thursday.

While he wound up fifth fastest in the final session on Thursday afternoon, Eriksson however was generally held back by a sequence of unfortunate red-flag stoppages on his new-tyre runs, meaning he could not do himself proper justice on the overall timesheet.

“It’s obviously a bit frustrating having that kind of bad luck – because that’s what it was actually about – in such an important test as this,” says Jimmy Eriksson. “Whenever we went out on new tyres, someone brought out the red flags and I had to abandon my runs. Testing is not primarily about setting quick lap times, but you inevitably want some kind of confirmation on where you stand. I don’t think we had a representative understanding of that this week, but our race runs were all the more positive. We were among the quickest cars out there over a race distance, with very consistent tyre behaviour, so I was really happy about that.”

Eriksson now travels on to France and Circuit Paul Ricard, where his younger brother Joel is set to make his FIA F3 European Championship debut this weekend.

Jimmy Eriksson’s 2016 racing programme will be announced in due course.