Barcelona Tests 1 – Day 3: Alonso Sees Noon at His Doorstep

Slightly hindered yesterday by an exhaust issue that Ferrari deliberately pushed to its limits to gather knowledge on mechanical failures of this type, Fernando Alonso experienced a relatively calm day this time (97 laps covered, equivalent to a Spanish GP plus half of another) which he concluded by setting the fastest time of the day. His lap, clocking in at 1:21.875 and achieved on soft tires, was slightly slower than Sergio Pérez’s McLaren the previous day, but doesn’t indicate the form the two cars will take.

Behind the Scuderia driver, Nico Hülkenberg in his Sauber, who clocked a time of 1:22.160, also on soft tires. The German started his day with short performance stints, averaging 3 or 4 laps, before increasing the length of the runs in the afternoon, still relatively short compared to other drivers as they averaged around 8 laps. He nevertheless covered a distance of 91 laps without major issues.

To complete this “podium,” and as with the first two days, a Lotus driver in the person of Romain Grosjean. The Franco-Swiss driver recorded his time at the same moment as Fernando Alonso’s best time, around 12:25, also on soft tires. Notably, after the setbacks of his teammate on Tuesday and Wednesday, his day was rather studious as he covered 119 laps (the second-best total for a driver in one day in Barcelona this year, after Lewis Hamilton’s 121 laps on Wednesday), already more than Kimi Räikkönen (87 in two days), and even managed to perform a race simulation by covering 66 consecutive laps, which represents the length of a normal Spanish Grand Prix.

In fourth place, Nico Rosberg is the first driver not to have set his time on soft tires: the German clocked a 1:22.611 on the timesheet using medium tires. After a disrupted day on Monday, Kéké’s son was able to complete the Catalunya circuit 108 times, multiplying the long stints in the afternoon.

Next comes Pastor Maldonado, who only drove this morning. That still gave him time to complete a race simulation, which is good news for Williams, even though it was only unveiled on Tuesday morning. The Venezuelan set his time of 1:22.675 on soft tires but at just 10:00 a.m., when the track was still very cool. His replacement, Valtteri Bottas, had the afternoon to himself, which allowed him to achieve a time of 1:22.826 on softs and attempt a small race simulation starting at 3:30 p.m., unfortunately interrupted around 4:45 p.m. by a red flag.

Following them are Jenson Button, discreet at the wheel of his McLaren as Sergio Pérez was on his first day, Adrian Sutil, who completed his test day with Force India by urging the company’s leaders to quickly decide on their second driver, and Mark Webber who, after focusing on rather short stints in the morning, began a race simulation in the mid-afternoon that was interrupted 11 laps from the end by the only red flag of the day.

In the last three positions, we find Jean-Eric Vergne who completed 106 laps at the wheel of the Toro Rosso, focusing on 6-8 lap runs in search of performance, Max Chilton – the least active driver today with 58 laps completed – whose team chose to work on starts during the morning before proceeding with a planned suspension change, and finally Giedo Van der Garde who had to abandon his Caterham on the track 15 minutes before the end of the day after setting his own best time.

If you want to know in detail what happened today, you can relive the day’s live coverage.

Final Ranking Barcelona 1 – Day 3