Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsForce India

Force India to launch on morning of first test

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Force India has confirmed it will unveil its 2016 car on the morning of the first pre-season test in Barcelona.

Testing gets underway at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya on Monday, with Force India joining Haas, Williams and Manor in unveiling their cars in the pit lane ahead of the start of running on February 22. The team will roll out the Mercedes-powered VJM09 half an hour before testing gets underway.

"Here's the plan for testing next week: The VJM09 will break cover on Monday morning at 8:30am Spanish time in the BCN pit lane," the team confirmed on Twitter.

Force India will field an unchanged driver line-up of Nico Hulkenberg and Sergio Perez for the third year in a row as the team looks to build on fifth place in the constructors' championship last season.

Technical director Andy Green recently told F1i the new car will be an evolution of last year's impressive B-spec VJM08 which finished the season so strongly after being introduced at the British Grand Prix. Green also described the new Mercedes power unit as "a good step forward" for 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.