Bahrain Testing 2 – Day 3 (morning): Massa leads, Red Bull and Lotus struggling

The morning of the third day of the final winter tests saw Felipe Massa take the best time, at 1:37.224. The Brazilian, completing 48 laps, set a lap time four seconds off the best times recorded last week.

Behind him, Nico Hülkenberg’s Force India is ahead of the Mercedes of the other Nico, Rosberg this time, who completed 22 laps after rejoining the session late due to a precautionary engine change.

In fourth position, Daniil Kvyat managed to complete the Sakhir circuit 41 times with his Toro Rosso powered by Renault. He was ahead of Kevin Magnussen, who completed 24 laps with the McLaren, and Kimi Räikkönen whose Ferrari didn’t even manage ten laps, due to a connector problem according to German media.

Marcus Ericsson, behind the wheel of the Caterham, was the most active on track with 69 laps and an almost complete race simulation by the end of the morning. A rather studious day so far for Jules Bianchi, who covered the Bahraini circuit 54 times but was the cause of the second red flag that ended the morning session. Behind them, Romain Grosjean managed to complete 14 laps at fairly low speed without encountering any issues.

Finally, Red Bull in great difficulty, still: Sebastian Vettel was unable to set a single time and even had to stop first on his very first out lap and a second time in the pit lane. Adrian Sutil, for his part, had to step out after an initial installation lap, with smoke and then flames escaping from his car.