Barcelona pre-season test: Ferrari on top
The day concluded at 6pm local time with nearly 800 laps completed by the 11 drivers and teams involved in today's track activities.
Already at the start of the session the new Ferrari has shown good pace, quickly allowing Sebastian Vettel to score what was the best time of the day: 1'24”939. Less than 0.3 seconds slower than the 2015 pole position and nearly half a second faster than triple world champion Lewis Hamilton's Mercedes, which completed the highest number of laps of the day - 156.
Drivers and teams concentrated mainly on long stints with White medium tyres, which will be the main choice for the Spanish GP to come in mid-May.
Pirelli brought to Spain its new F1® 2016 range, now complete with the latest Ultrasoft compound, recognized by its Purple colouring, the softest compound available this year. Four teams have chosen the Ultrasoft for these Spanish tests and are expected to test it in the next few days, even though it won't be available for the Spanish GP scheduled for mid-May in Round 5 of the world championship season.
The highly abrasive surface and high energy in the corners of the Montmelò circuit, one of the most demanding on tyres, require tyres with a harder compound: Hard, Medium and Soft are expectable.
This first session of testing will finish on Thursday, after four days on track.
A second 4 day session will take place on this same circuit from March 1st to the 4th. It will be the last one before leaving to Australia for the first GP of the 2016 World Championship season.
