We admired the new shapes of the cars, we listened to the ambitions of the teams, but today the words and impressions hit zero and made room for the track. This morning the first day of pre-season tests in Barcelona started, on the Montmelò track, and Charles Leclerc set the best time of the morning session.
The Ferrari driver stopped the clock in 1’20 “165 using a set of C3 compounds – recognizable by the yellow band on the shoulders of the 18” Pirelli – in a 5-lap run in the second part of the morning. This means that the Ferrari man’s time trial is 3 “5 from the time of the pole signed by Hamilton (in extremely different conditions, we want to emphasize this).
The F1-75 was one of the most active single-seaters on the track: Leclerc completed 80 laps, like the Red Bull of world champion Max Verstappen. This means that the Rossa and the RB18 turned out to be workaholics of the morning.
Ferrari concentrated on several aerodynamic evaluations in the first part of the morning, and then did a series of runs in the second. Behind the Red is Lando Norris’ McLaren MCL36. The Briton stopped 3 tenths of a second behind Leclerc, three tenths of a second behind George Russell’s Mercedes W13.
George Russell, Mercedes W13
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
Already many runs for the British. First several series of 5 laps, then these are increased to 10 until reaching the threshold of 77 overall laps. Behind the top three is Sebastian Vettel’s Aston Martin, 1 “1 behind Leclerc’s Ferrari and 4 tenths faster than Yuki Tsunoda’s AlphaTauri AT03.
It is interesting to underline how the top 5 of the classification obtained their respective best times with C3 compounds (yellow band), while the sixth, that is Max Verstappen with the long-awaited RB18, is sixth. As already mentioned, Red Bull amazed for the extreme shapes of the RB18, but also for the continuity with which we saw on the track the latest creature born from the genius of Adrian Newey. 80 laps, just like Ferrari, and the certainty that he never looked for time.
Verstappen’s best time was obtained with C2 compounds and he is 2 “1 behind Leclerc. But today, we know, times matter little. Fernando Alonso seventh with Alpine, a few thousandths faster than Nicholas Latifi’s WIlliams The Grove team has done a lot of aerodynamic tests, even covering the nose, front wing, bellies and rear wing in fluo yellow flow-viz to better understand the flow trend.
Penultimate time for Nikita Mazepin’s Haas. The Russian completed just 20 laps, but Alfa Romeo Racing did worse. The team from Hinwil, who lined up Robert Kubica this morning, did not go beyond 9 laps overall due to a problem related to the C42 splitter hitting the asphalt. The same problem had already occurred in the Shakedown made in Fiorano a few days ago. The last time of the morning belongs to the Pole. The afternoon session will start at 14:00 Italian time, after the lunch break.
Pos | Pilot | Team | Time | Gap | Turns |
1 | Charles Leclerc | Ferrari | 1: 20.165 | 80 | |
2 | Lando Norris | McLaren | 1: 20.474 | + 0.309s | 50 |
3 | George Russell | Mercedes | 1: 20.784 | + 0.619s | 77 |
4 | Sebastian Vettel | Aston Martin | 1: 21.276 | + 1.111s | 52 |
5 | Yuki Tsunoda | AlphaTauri | 1: 21.638 | + 1.473s | 44 |
6 | Max Verstappen | Red Bull | 1: 22.246 | + 2.081s | 80 |
7 | Fernando Alonso | Alpine | 1: 23.317 | + 3.152s | 54 |
8 | Nicholas Latifi | Williams | 1: 23.379 | + 3.214s | 66 |
9 | Nikita Mazepin | Haas | 1: 24.505 | + 4.340s | 20 |
10 | Robert Kubica | Alfa Romeo | 1: 25.909 | + 5,744s | 9 |
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