Sebastian Vettel tops time sheets on final day at Barcelona

Sebastian Vettel tops the timesheets on the final day of the second pre-season F1 test at Barcelona

At the final day of the second pre-season F1 test of the 2016 season at the Circuit de Barcelona, Sebastian Vettel was quickest ahead of Toro Rosso driver Carlos Sainz and Williams driver Felipe Massa.

After two weeks of pounding round the high-speed track outside Barcelona, Ferrari laid claim to the two fastest lap times of the winter. Sebastian Vettel was quickest with a lap time of 1:22.852. But a true picture of the competitive order ahead of the first race in Australia in two weeks is not so clear.

Toro Rosso’s Carlos Sainz finished the final day of testing in second place after using the purple-striped ultra-soft tyres. His lap was the fourth fastest over the four days of the second test and underlines the progress Toro Rosso appears to have made since switching from Renault power to year-old Ferrari engines this year.

But the Williams team remains a likely contender for best of the rest and Felipe Massa completed another positive day in the FW38 with 129 laps and ended the test in third place. Force India is also in the running for a strong finish at the first race, with Sergio Perez finishing in fourth place.

However, Perez’s day was cut short at 60 laps when he stopped on track in the afternoon. World Champion Lewis Hamilton finished the day in fifth place after setting his quickest time on the mediums, but was still quicker than Daniel Ricciardo who ended the session in sixth place.

However, for the first time this pre-season the Mercedes came to an unexpected halt on track and caused a red flag. The problem was traced to a transmission issue and brought an early end to Lewis Hamilton’s final morning in the car. Not long after lunch Mercedes fixed the issue and prepared the car for Nico Rosberg to take over in the afternoon and complete another 70 laps.

Jenson Button finished the test in seventh place as McLaren completed another long day of no-thrills testing. However, in an interview to the media this afternoon; McLaren racing director Eric Boullier said plenty more performance would be bolted on to the car for the opening race and that they are not running the full 2016 specification on the car at the moment.

Jolyon Palmer ended the test in eighth place after completing 90 laps in the Renault, but has admitted that his first pre-season as a full-time driver had not gone to plan. But he finished ahead of Marcus Ericsson in ninth place and ahead of newcomers Haas who have recovered from a brake-by-wire issue that pitched Romain Grosjean into a spin twice on Thursday to complete 91 laps between its two drivers on Friday.

With Romain Grosjean and Esteban Gutierrez finishing in tenth and eleventh places, the team still finished the test with less mileage than it had hoped for and could find themselves at the back of the grid with Manor come the first race.

But the Manor team had another tricky day on Friday due to a mechanical issue in the morning. After completing one lap before lunch, Rio Haryanto managed another 57 laps in the afternoon but still finished in twelfth place by the end of the day despite a run on the ultra-soft tyres.

Nico Rosberg finished the final day at the bottom of the timesheets, but was working on longer runs using much harder rubber. On the final day of the test, the Mercedes team did restrict itself to a programme of long runs on medium tyres, which has been a staple run plan of the team throughout winter testing.

In conclusion, in terms of pure mileage, Mercedes finished the two weeks streets ahead of its main rival with a total of 1294 laps — the equivalent of twice driving from the team’s base in Brackley to the Circuit de Catalunya and back again — compared to Ferrari’s 854.
But the true gap in performance between Mercedes and Ferrari is likely to remain unknown until the first qualifying session in Melbourne in two weeks, but Vettel appeared confident when talking to the media later this afternoon about how things have progressed during the pre-season testing period.

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

Day Four Timesheet:-

1. Sebastian Vettel – Ferrari – 1:22.852 – 142 laps
2. Carlos Sainz – Toro Rosso – 1:23.134 – 133 laps
3. Felipe Massa – Williams – 1:23.644 – 129 laps
4. Sergio Perez – Force India – 1:23.721 – 60 laps
5. Lewis Hamilton – Mercedes – 1:24.133 – 69 laps
6. Daniel Ricciardo – Red Bull – 1:24.427 – 123 laps
7. Jenson Button – McLaren – 1:24.714 – 121 laps
8. Jolyon Palmer – Renault – 1:24.859 – 90 laps
9. Marcus Ericsson – Sauber – 1:25.031 – 132 laps
10. Romain Grosjean – Haas – 1:25.255 – 66 laps
11. Esteban Gutierrez – Haas – 1:25.422 – 25 laps
12. Rio Haryanto – Manor – 1:25.899 – 58 laps
13: Nico Rosberg – Mercedes – 1:26.140 – 70 laps

Keep your eyes peeled at Driving for Pleasure for the latest F1 news before the Australian GP.

Sarah Jones- @jonesy_laaa