SAKHIR, Bahrain – Pierre Gasly booked the fastest time on the first day of this week’s pre-season test in Bahrain, but it was Mercedes who turned around with a significant upgrade to his car.
Gasly used the softest compound tires to set the fastest time of day for his AlphaTauri, putting him 0.457 seconds ahead of his nearest opponent. The timing has all the hallmarks of a fuel economy effort, done on a lap track, on C5 tire compound, and when the sun goes down and the track conditions are at their best.
The gap to Carlos Sainz in second looks impressive on paper but is easily put in context by Ferrari running a two-way tougher tire combination. The softer the compound, the more grip the tire will have when new, but the faster the performance will degrade. The performance interval between compounds is expected to be a value of 0.5 s under normal conditions.
Charles Leclerc, who drove the Ferrari the morning before handing over to Sainz at lunch, set the third fastest time, 0.172 seconds lower than his teammate using the same C3 tyres. Lance Stroll was fourth, backing 0.2 seconds and using a C5 compound, ahead of Alex Albon on Team Williams on the C4s. Practice ended a few minutes early when Sergio Perez, the 10th fastest runner in Red Bull on the C3s, turned at slow speed and crashed into his car on the gravel at the exit of Turn 8.
But lap times alone without the context of fuel loads and engine settings can be misleading, and the focus on the lap is instead on the new Mercedes look. The car gets a significant and obvious upgrade to its sidepod in Bahrain, with smaller outlets and a complete separation between the side impact structure and the sidepod itself.
The design immediately raises questions about its legitimacy, but Mercedes is confident that its dialogue with the FIA during the vehicle’s development means the regulator will issue a ruling in favor if the design is compromised. protest.
However, early signs suggest that Mercedes still has a lot of work to do to get the performance out of its car. The W13 continued to struggle with porter jumping – an issue that affected all teams to some extent during the first test in Barcelona (link to story) – and both Lewis Hamilton and George Russell appeared to be struggling with the car being braked.
“The car, we’re really proud of what we’ve achieved in terms of the concept, but now we need to make it go really fast,” said team boss Toto Wolff. “It’s a direction of development that we like. It’s tuning the car. We’re experimenting a lot and approach it with curiosity.
“There are specific problems in Bahrain; the weather is hot, the cars go straight and through corners, so it’s a tuning question and we haven’t really looked at the performance data.”
Hamilton, the morning driver, finished the day with the 11th fastest time, while teammate Russell, the afternoon driver, finished ninth. Both drivers made the fastest lap times. their on C3 tire compound.
The Haas F1 team missed their morning training session as an unusual result of their cargo being delayed en route to Bahrain. The team managed to get its car on track for the afternoon for 47 laps with reserve driver Pietro Fittipaldi at the helm.
Haas was expected to get four hours running it was missed on Thursday morning back into the weekend because of freight delays as a result of Formula One chartering experiencing technical problems. The current plan is for Haas to run an extra two hours at night on the second and third days of the test to make it in time, but exact details are yet to be confirmed.
Last time, first day:
1. Pierre Gasly – AlphaTauri – 1: 33,902 – 103 rounds
2. Carlos Sainz – Ferrari – 1: 34,359 – 82 laps
3. Charles Leclerc – Ferrari – 1: 34,531 – 64 laps
4. Lance Stroll – Aston Martin – 1: 34,736 – 50 laps
5. Alex Albon – Williams – 1: 35,070 – 104 rounds
6. Lando Norris – McLaren – 1: 35,356 – 50 laps
7. Valtteri Bottas – Alfa Romeo – 1: 35,495 – 66 laps
8. Sebastian Vettel – Aston Martin – 1: 35.706 – 39 laps
9. George Russell – Mercedes – 1: 35,941 – 60 laps
10. Sergio Perez – Red Bull – 1: 35.977 – 138 laps
11. Lewis Hamilton – Mercedes – 1: 36,365 – 62 laps
12. Fernando Alonso – Alpine – 1: 36,745 – 24 laps
13. Esteban Ocon – Alpine – 1: 36,768 – 42 rounds
14. Guanyu Zhou – Alfa Romeo – 1: 37.164 – 54 rounds
15. Pietro Fittipaldi – Haas – 1: 37,422 – 47 laps
