The second day of testing in Barcelona is over. This means that the teams are already over half way in Barcelona. For many teams there is nothing wrong, but some teams saw a wasted day. Red Bull Racing, for example, had a completely different day from yesterday.

Verstappen lucky and Perez unlucky?

On Wednesday, nothing seemed to be wrong in the Red Bull Racing garage. Max Verstappen was at the wheel and because almost nothing happened, the Dutchman was able to drive no less than 150 laps. The second day that teammate Sergio Perez took care of went completely different. With half an hour to go his RB18 suddenly stopped. The Mexican was unable to drive away and a red flag fell.

The problem turned out to be the gearbox and fortunately the team was able to solve it quickly. Because in the first half of the day many teams drove mainly with the 'wind racks' to collect aerodynamic data, there was no action. The hoped and expected action for the afternoon was not there either. However, there was more driving especially by Daniel Ricciardo, Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon. Perez stuck to 61 laps and picked up a fifteenth time. He was faster than Lewis Hamilon, who drove only one part of the day.

With Perez's 61 laps, Red Bull is almost the least productive team. The team is as productive as Alfa Romeo today. As a result, Zhou's first day almost fell into the water. Alfa drove only 32 laps in total yesterday and in the morning only 21 were added by Valtteri Bottas. Yet in the afternoon things went a little better and Zhou ended up with a total of sixty laps.

Teams suffer from 'porpoising'

Before lunch, Alpine seemed to be suffering the most from porpoising. On the straight towards Turn 1, the cars were bumping up and down briskly. Ferrari team boss Mattia Binotto told F1 journalist Chris Medland that it's a problem that most teams experience. It is a problem that has been underestimated and the cars are bumping more than previously thought.

Aston Martin's AMR22 seems to be suffering a lot at all. The problem with porpoising is that the downforce level fluctuates a lot. The fact that this happens on the straight is very annoying because at the high speeds the bumping can result in floor damage. In doing so, Aston Martin indicated that their car is as slow as a snail in the slow corners.

Ferrari versus McLaren

It was Daniel Ricciardo who held the fastest lap for a long time. In the last hour of the day he was passed by rival Charles Leclerc. The Monegasque therefore recorded the fastest time of the day with a 1:19:804. Gasly also got there in the last hour. The Frenchman was faster than Ricciardo but just a tenth slower than the Ferrari driver.

The most productive drivers were Ricciardo, Gasly and Esteban Ocon. Gasly crossed the finish line the most often with 133. This makes him no more productive than Verstappen yesterday. Schumacher and Mazepin at Haas F1 were also productive together despite Mazepin's fuel supply problems.

#F1: Mercedes and Red Bull share last row in today's testing... pic.twitter.com/IMIKNTKtkI

— Andreas Haupt (@andihaupt1) February 24, 2022