Barcelona Testing 2 – Day 3: Perez Fastest Time

After Romain Grosjean during the first two days, it’s now Sergio Perez’s turn to be the fastest at the Circuit de Catalunya. The Mexican driver took advantage of a short stint – three qualifying-style laps with Soft tires – to set the best time of the day and the best time of these three days so far.

The Sauber driver narrowly leads Jenson Button in the McLaren and Daniel Ricciardo in the Toro Rosso. Unlike yesterday, the day was scarcely disrupted by red flags – with only one attributed to Bruno Senna at the end of the session.

This morning, the teams primarily focused on short stints – around ten laps – with Medium or Soft tires, and also on very short stints – an out lap, a timed lap, and an in-lap to the pits – to work on qualifying. And in this little game, it was Sergio Perez who stood out.

In the afternoon, the teams mostly worked on long stints and race simulations, and the drivers covered many laps – six of them finished with more than 100 laps. Daniel Ricciardo is the driver who completed the most laps today, with 131 laps. He is followed in this ranking by Nico Rosberg (129 laps) and Felipe Massa (122 laps).

On the problems side, Jenson Button had his share. The British driver experienced a hydraulic issue in the middle of the morning and was only able to cover 44 laps in total. Kimi Räikkönen also encountered some difficulties with his steering, and the Lotus team decided to change it, which took a good part of the morning. The Finn ended the day with only 43 laps covered.

The rain also made a brief appearance this afternoon, which gave Daniel Ricciardo and Toro Rosso the opportunity to test the intermediate tires. Senna, Rosberg, and Massa also took the opportunity to switch to intermediates and conduct some tests to collect data.

Barcelona Private Trials 2 – Day 3 Standings