Kimi Raikkonen tops the timesheets on Day 3 of the second pre-season F1 test at Barcelona

At the third second day of the second pre-season F1 test of the 2016 season at the Circuit de Barcelona, Kimi Raikkonen was quickest ahead of Williams driver Felipe Massa and Force India driver Nico Hulkenberg as new team Haas continued to struggle with another reliability issue.

Kimi Raikkonen's lap time of a 1:22.765 replaced team-mate Sebastian Vettel’s best effort from the first week of testing and set a new benchmark to for the final day of the pre-season on Friday. The time was set on Pirelli’s new ultra-soft compound, which reigning champions Mercedes have opted not to use this winter.

With testing times on different days rarely offer a fair comparison; you could argue that Ferrari’s effort sends a message of intent just two weeks remaining before the first race weekend gets underway in Melbourne. Raikkonen went on to complete a race simulation in the afternoon, mimicking Mercedes run plan on the opening days of this week’s test.

Raikkonen finished ahead of Felipe Massa in second place whose lap time was within two tenths of the Raikkonen/Rosberg soft tyre target time which does suggest that the Williams team has also made solid progress with its car over the winter. Massa finished ahead of Nico Hulkenberg in third place ahead of Max Verstappen who finished in fourth place.

Nico Rosberg finished the day in fifth place ahead of Felipe Nasr in sixth place and Fernando Alonso in seventh place as both Sauber and McLaren focused on mileage and both teams managed well over 100 laps. It was also Fernando Alonso’s last day behind the wheel of the MP4-31 ahead of the Australian Grand Prix and he set the team’s best time of the test so far on super soft tyres.

Manor struggled for laps again with just 48 for Pascal Wherlein over the day who managed to finish in eighth place ahead of Daniil Kvyat in ninth place, Jolyon Palmer in tenth place and Lewis Hamilton in eleventh place.

Meanwhile the Haas team have resolved the turbo problem that limited Esteban Gutierrez to one lap on Wednesday. However, the new American team’s 78 laps were far from smooth, with Romain Grosjean twice ending up in the gravel either side of the lunch break and ended the day in twelfth place.

The session was brought to an early end when Grosjean was forced to park his car on track 10 minutes before the chequered flag.

Thursday’s test day also marked the first public debut of a new cockpit protection system which is set to be introduced next year. Raikkonen tested an early development of the Halo device and completed a single lap in the morning with the prototype attached to the SF16-H.
Although plans are not yet finalised for 2017, the Halo device is expected to be chosen over a closed canopy, which is also being considered longer term.

Here's the official classification from Day Three of the pre-season test as follows:-

Day Three Timesheet:-

1. Kimi Raikkonen- Ferrari- 1.22.765- 136 laps
2. Felipe Massa- Williams- 1.23.193- 119 laps
3. Nico Hulkenberg- Force India- 1.23.251- 137 laps
4. Max Verstappen- Toro Rosso- 1.23.382- 159 laps
5. Nico Rosberg- Mercedes- 1.24.126- 81 laps
6. Felipe Nasr- Sauber- 1.24.760- 116 laps
7. Fernando Alonso- McLaren- 1.24.870- 118 laps
8. Pascal Wehrlein- Manor- 1.24.913- 48 laps
9. Daniil Kvyat- Red Bull- 1.25.141- 121 laps
10. Jolyon Palmer- Renault- 1.26.224- 98 laps
11. Lewis Hamilton- Mercedes- 1.26.488- 63 laps
12. Romain Grosjean- Haas- 1.27.196- 78 laps

Keep your eyes peeled at Driving for Pleasure for our report of the final day of the second F1 pre-season test at the Circuit de Barcelona tomorrow.

Sarah Jones- @jonesy_laaa