Toro Rosso 'chasing a few tenths'

Daniel Ricciardo says Toro Rosso is hoping to find a 'couple of tenths' from updates being run during this week's three-day F1test session at the Mugello circuit in Italy.

The team has picked up nine points so far this season ahead of the start of the European leg of the campaign in Barcelona later this month, with upgrades being added to the STR7 leaving Ricciardo confident of forward progress.

While the Australian insists that he doesn't expect the changes to suddenly enable the team to find half a second compared to its rivals, he said he felt hopeful that the improvements would allow it to make up some time on track.

"We've got some new pieces to test," he told The Inside Back. "We've got a new diffuser, the underneath of the car, and then we've got some new-shape exhausts to try out, which are pretty big things. They're classified as big changes and hopefully they test as well as we see on the data when they are designed.

"It's always hard but if they work out, you'd be happy with a couple tenths or something. I think half a second is a little bit optimistic, but if we can gain a couple of tenths then everything adds up. As long as we're getting faster.

"Normally we'd test tyres, too, but the new pieces are going to take quite a lot of time, bolting on and bolting off."