Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsManor

Manor to skip Barcelona test

Manor will not take part in next week's in-season test at Barcelona, F1i has learned.

A two-day test will take place on Tuesday and Wednesday after the race at the Circuit de Catalunya, with nine of the ten teams set to run. However, Manor will not be among them as it feels it will have little benefit to the team, which is using a modified 2014 car at present.

Sporting director Graeme Lowdon confirmed to F1i the team would not be staying in Spain after the race.

"No, we've got no plans to test next week," Lowdon said. "It doesn't really feature for what we need to do at this stage so we won't be testing.

"Focus is just elsewhere. I think we know this car pretty well!"

However, Lowdon also revealed the team is pushing ahead with plans to introduce a 2015 car later in the season, despite team principal John Booth having admitted Manor could defer until 2016.

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.