Undertaking his Formula One debut at the Catalunya circuit in Barcelona yesterday behind the wheel of a TF106B was none other than Kamui Kobayashi from the Toyota team’s Young Drivers Program. The 20-year-old winner of the Rookie Cup in the 2006 F3 Euro series and pole sitter at this month's Macau GP spent his day getting used to the car and putting in mileage on various systems and thoroughly enjoyed his first day of F1 testing

Kamui put in a best time of 1m20.731 after a total of 81 laps, or 383.1 km, and was absolutely delighted with the end result….

"I am obviously delighted that Panasonic Toyota Racing has given me the chance to test the Formula 1 car here as part of my role in the Toyota Young Drivers Program. Today was my first F1 test and it was a very enjoyable experience. Everything is completely different from the Formula 3 cars that I have been driving this year - especially the power of the engine and the braking - so I have to concentrate harder than ever,” he said.

“I made a mistake just before lunch and went off but there was no damage and we were able to put in a lot of laps without any other problems. The G-forces are a lot stronger than I have been used to, but my neck doesn't feel too bad so far. Of course, that's only one day and I'm sure I will have to train harder to be able to cope with the forces over longer periods. I still have a long way to go to improve but overall it was a good day. I am next scheduled to test the car next week at Jerez so I look forward to gaining some more experience of F1 there."

"Kamui did well today because he had to learn the circuit as well as the handling of the car. He put in a lot of laps and he was very careful in the car and always aware of the other competitors on the track,” added Gerd Pfeiffer, Test Team Manager. “He put in mileage on the gearbox and engine and looked at different weight distributions and software. Of course, the main focus of this week's test is to try out the new Bridgestone tyres which we will use in 2007 but it is still too early to judge how the rubber performs. We need consistent conditions to compare and contrast tyres and today the circuit was never really stable enough to draw any real conclusions.”

The Toyota team will continue its Barcelona test today with race drivers Ralf Schumacher and Jarno Trulli.