Red Bull conclude fantastic test week with superior time

Red Bull Racing and Sergio Pérez ended the week of testing in Bahrain with the fastest time. The Mexican driver set a 1:30.305 on C4s and that time was too powerful for the competition. Ferrari seems to be the second team in the pecking order based on the three days of testing, while Mercedes has work to do if it wants to attack the top teams next week at the first Grand Prix of the season.

In the morning session, Charles Leclerc was the fastest of the bunch with a 1:31.0. De Vries was the most productive man with 87 laps, although he did not drive a single fast lap. There were problems for Valtteri Bottas. His Alfa Romeo car had to be towed away after mechanical problems with an hour to go until lunch. However, the Finnish driver was just able to get back on track quickly in the second part of the third day of testing.

Perez and Alexander Albon also crawled back into their cars in the afternoon. The other seven teams saw new drivers get in with Carlos Sainz, Lando Norris, Kevin Magnussen, Yuki Tsunoda, Lewis Hamilton, Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso. These men were expected to start driving some qualifying laps and that turned out to be the case in the end.

Tough day McLaren

In the morning, the McLaren team already experienced the necessary problems with the wheel covers and the afternoon was no different. Norris does not get beyond 37 laps, as there is a lot of tinkering with his MCL60. In terms of lap times, too, things are not going well at the Woking-based stable. While McLaren still finished fifth among constructors in 2022, some other mid-tier teams seem to have passed them by now.

At AlphaTauri, De Vries already showed hopeful things in terms of longruns in the morning session and in the qualifying runs, teammate Tsunoda also impressed later in the day. On the C4s, he comes close to the times of Ferrari (who also only used the C4s). However, the midfield is hugely competitive, with Haas F1, Aston Martin and Alfa Romeo also moving around the sub-top positions. Williams had a good day on Friday with Logan Saergant in the car, but Alexander Albon's pace on the final day of testing was downright disappointing.

Softer tyres in closing stages

In the final two hours, we see more and more teams adding the C4s and C5s. Lewis Hamilton leads the way by setting a 1:30.8 on the softest compound available, making him faster than Leclerc in the morning. Sergio Perez cannot match that time in his first two attempts on the C4s, but on attempt three he does.<

Then Hamilton improves again, but fails to pass the Red Bull driver on the timesheet. The Ferraris of Leclerc and Sainz are initially behind. The Alfa Romeo is going well this Saturday, and this is once again evident when Bottas manages to slot between Hamilton and Leclerc in third place on his C5s in the final hour.

Albon most prolific driver

Albon finishes on 136 laps, which is three more than Perez. Bottas follows on 131 laps. However, Williams, Red Bull and Alfa Romeo are not the teams with the most kilometres on the final day. Aston Martin, AlphaTauri and Haas F1, among others, completed more lap s if we add up the morning and afternoon.