Max Verstappen (Red Bull), the reigning double world champion, signed this Thursday on the Bahrain circuit the best time of the first morning of pre-season tests. The Dutchman was ahead of Carlos Sainz (Ferrari) and Alexander Albon (Williams). At the wheel of his Red Bull, the Dutchman was a very short head ahead of the veteran of the grid, the Spaniard Fernando Alonso, 41, who is defending the colors of Aston Martin this season.
The Ferraris of Spaniard Carlos Sainz and Monegasque Charles Leclerc set the 3rd and 4th best times of the day on the Sakhir circuit, where the first Grand Prix of the season will be held next week. However, no conclusions should be drawn from this first day of testing, since the teams use these three days of testing to perfect the settings of their single-seaters, as Sainz explains: “We focused on updating tuned, combined with tire and aero(dynamic) testing, as well as testing with different fuel levels.”
“Good day”
Under a bright sun and around twenty degrees, Verstappen is also the only driver to have chained laps throughout the day. The other teams, each having only one single-seater for these tests, preferred to alternate between their two pilots. The number 1 on the grid completed a whopping 157 laps, more than double that of almost all the other competitors.
“We had a good day today, we did a lot of laps, which we wanted, almost the equivalent of three Grands Prix,” he said. On Friday, he will share the wheel of his RB19, the lines of which were (finally) revealed on Thursday since the team had only presented one livery until then, with his teammate Sergio Pérez, before leaving the Mexican alone on the track. SATURDAY.
Change of strategist at Ferrari
Ferrari also has reason to be satisfied with its day with the good behavior of its SF-23, which has not yet encountered any reliability problems that have marred its 2022 season. “Reliability was good and we were able to run without problems (…) collecting valuable data, which is encouraging,” explained Leclerc.
Also singled out for its strategic errors in the race last year, the Scuderia, now led by Frenchman Frédéric Vasseur, has also announced a major change in its ranks since the Spaniard Inaki Rueda, head of strategy, has gave way to Indian Ravin Jain.
At Mercedes, this day was above all the opportunity for the third force on the grid in 2022 to note that its porpoising problems which hampered its performance in 2022, seem to have disappeared. “We didn’t see any rebounds”, noted his boss Toto Wolff, despite some “movements in turn 12, the fastest”. “But it’s not at all comparable to what we had last year, and at this stage it doesn’t limit our performance.”
Bad day for the French
At the wheel of the W14, Britons Lewis Hamilton and George Russell end the day with the 6th and 9th best times respectively, times that are anecdotal at the moment. On the French side, Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon achieved the 16th and 17th times respectively during this day essentially devoted to the running-in of their Alpine.
“Satisfied”, Gasly, details: “we were not aiming for performance, we were trying to identify the weaknesses on which to work”. The Norman is gradually adapting to his new single-seater, after more than three years with AlphaTauri.
At the very beginning of the day, the tests were neutralized because the Brazilian Felipe Drugovich, reserve driver at Aston Martin and who replaced the Canadian Lance Stroll, injured in a fall on his bike, suffered electronic problems… after only four turns. ! The time to clear his single-seater, the pilots were able to return to the track about twenty minutes later.