As a fan watching Formula One over the years, it has always been difficult to predict the success of a new team. All you have is testing and practices to make up your mind up and most of the time these cannot be an accurate source.

A team may be using a certain set-up or new parts that will make the car perform not at its full capacity. This can be seen to be what is happening at Virgin Racing.

Yes their testing has revealed that they are more than five seconds behind frontrunners, but isn’t this normal for all new teams? Perhaps, except if your name is Ross Brawn.

With the new car made only with CFD, it is going to take time to get it right. We won’t see the true pace of the car until at least the Montreal Grand Prix in June when more updates have been done. These first few races are an extended testing period for them with on-the-job training being the team’s main principle.

Their aim in Bahrain would be to just finish and find what set-up is best in racing conditions; anything near gaining a point would be a very welcome bonus.

They didn’t get past Q1 on Saturday, leaving them fighting the likes of Lotus and Hispania Racing, who have had little to none in the way of testing.

New boy Lucas di Grassi may have the looks of a Formula One driver, but as far as racing talent goes, he looks a little out of his depth. At times, he was over a second behind team-mate Timo Glock with major improvement required if he is going to make an impact. But Virgin has fully backed the Brazilian driver and believes he can more than succeed in Formula One.

Personally, I have seen very little of him except a few races from his time in GP2 which he did alright in. We will just have to wait to see if he can be the next Ayrton Senna which all of Brazil hope he can be. But honestly and realistically, he’s more likely to be the next Nelson Piquet Jr. Ask me again in August and we will know more.

When Glock signed earlier this year after Toyota pulled out of F1, he was well prepared for this mini-setback in his career. He knew the car wouldn’t be the fastest and imitating his previous successes would be very difficult, but this didn’t stop him from being confident and excited about the 2010 season.

He is a good little driver who will work with the team and technical chief Nick Wirth to get the best out of the car. He may have many disappointments this season, but developing a team to greatness can be more rewarding than the odd success.

My opinion is that Virgin will struggle this season with all figures pointing them near to the back of the grid. For many involved within the team, to just be there is a life long goal and I’m sure they will enjoy every minute of this season. Pity they won’t have a lot in the way of points to show from it.

Join me and Victoria on Formula1FanCast.com’s Fantasy League Formula 1 2010. Our league is called Formula1Fancast.com and the league pin is 722. Try and beat us if you can, but be warned we’re good!

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