F1 Testing 2015: Week 3 Barcelona (26th - 1st)

McLaren have done more laps than another team. I repeat, MCLAREN HAVE DONE MORE LAPS THAN ANOTHER TEAM.

They're still doing short runs though, which isn't as promising.

I wasn't worried for them in Abu Dhabi. Nor was I worried in Jerez. But they really needed to get some more laps under their belt last week and certainly need to start getting some longer runs sorted now if they're to have a chance of even being able to get through qualifying (not that they're chasing performance early in the season, but still, they need to show some progress).
 
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I'll wait for Australia before calling it - teams have surprised us before - but this really does look like it's going to be another long season for McLaren. The hope must be that there's real fire in that Honda unit when they eventually get it dialled in.
 
The issue is they haven't really had a chance to test it turned up which will likely bring with it the worries of reliability.

Sauber turning up the heat. I do wonder why ferrari are waiting until the last two days before doing race sims. I'm hoping it's because we are confident in race pace but the nagging feeling is we are hiding how average we are.

11:40 On another soft tyre run, Nasr improves by almost half a second, to a 1m24.071s.
Click to expand...

Not sure why Autosport have forgotten to update their time sheet.

Edit: Re Alonso

Just posted this video

 
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Sauber were give or take a little 2 seconds off the Williams pace in the US and Abu Dhabi races at the end of the season, half that in Brazil but much shorter track. To get within half a second of Williams, even if Sauber were going 100% and lowest fuel possible and Williams maybe had a few extra laps of fuel in, that won't change the times drastically, it's still way ahead of where they were last year.
 
drunkenmaster said:
Sauber were give or take a little 2 seconds off the Williams pace in the US and Abu Dhabi races at the end of the season, half that in Brazil but much shorter track. To get within half a second of Williams, even if Sauber were going 100% and lowest fuel possible and Williams maybe had a few extra laps of fuel in, that won't change the times drastically, it's still way ahead of where they were last year.
Click to expand...

It looks that way. I think the Ferrari power-plant has been improved an awful lot. It's not quite up there with the Mercedes, but it looks a long way ahead of the Renault now. It was 6 km/h slower down the straight than the Williams earlier, but then the Williams will continue to be an aerodynamically slippery car. Both Sauber and Ferrari were quicker than the Mercs yesterday too.

Obviously a long way to go, and it says nothing about the economy or driveability, but it's certainly got more punch than 2014.

Hard to predict, but we might see a 3 or 4 car battle for 2nd (depending how well Lotus have fixed their diffuser issues).



Meanwhile, if Honda still can't string together more than a 10 lap stint (despite a solid lap total today), it's looking like they'll be on their engine penalties by the time they've landed back in Europe. Still, it looks like the gremlins they've had are primarily electrical and of course that blasted seal, so hopefully they're easier to cure than a more fundamental mechanical ones (of which Renault had more of these issues last year).

Anyway, we're into afternoon now, so at any moment I expect a "we're done for the day" message.
 
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The sucking up to Mclaren of the Skysports feed is irksome.

"It has to be said that, when we've watched it closely on track, the Williams doesn't look a particularly nimble car. But it's proving itself to be fast and reliable - two outstanding virtues in a F1 car! One other observation the Sky Sports team were able to agree on over lunch is that the McLaren, whenever we've seen it, actually looks good on the track (even if it doesn't sound particularly good)."

That's great but, some cars are out there with whatever level of fuel and whatever tires and banging around doing proper realistic runs. Mclaren are almost certainly still doing lower engine power and lower fuel runs... surprise surprise as a car going around no where near it's top pace and slower than everyone else looks easier to handle.
 
Sub 1:23, though surprised they went soft tyre tbh. As Williams managed a 1:23.5 on softs yesterday I thought Merc would try and get close to that on the medium and then laugh at everyone come Australia again.

1:22.792, so what 7/10ths faster than Williams went though depends on conditions a bit.
 
1 Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1m22.792s
2 Valtteri Bottas Williams 1m23.995s +1.203
3 Felipe Nasr Sauber 1m24.071s +1.279
4 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 1m25.339s +2.547
5 Jenson Button McLaren 1m25.590s +2.798
6 Max Verstappen Toro Rosso 1m26.766s +3.974
7 Daniil Kvyat Red Bull 1m26.965s +4.173
8 Pastor Maldonado Lotus 1m28.013s +5.221
9 Nico Hulkenberg Force India 1m28.847s +6.055
 
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