The first day of testing for the 2016 season was a repeat of last year’s: Sebastian Vettel was quickest for Ferrari but Mercedes demonstrated stunning reliability out of the box.
Hamilton’s best lap time was just under half a second slower than Vettel’s benchmark of 1’24.939. Daniel Ricciardo was a further half-second back in third, fractionally quicker than the Williams of Valtteri Bottas. The entire field was covered by less than four-and-a-half seconds.
Of the eleven teams present all bar Sauber had their new cars ready for the first day of running. Newcomers Haas completed 31 laps with their new car, though Romain Grosjean had a scare when his front wing detached on the main straight. He was able to recover to the pits though the session had to be red-flagged while the track was cleared.
Manor, who failed to participate in any of last year’s pre-season tests, also got off to an encouraging start with their mew MRT05. Pascal Wehrlein lapped just over three seconds off the pace set by fellow Mercedes user Hamilton.
Toro Rosso also made third first appearance with a new engine supplier, Carlos Sainz Jnr driving a largely blank car now using 2015 Ferrari power. The car was only just completed in time for testing – hence the minimal livery – but lapped well until the team brought their running to an end after detecting a gearbox fault.
| Pos. | Car number | Driver | Team | Model | Best time | Gap | Laps | Tyres |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 5 | Sebastian Vettel | Ferrari | SF16-H | 1’24.939 | 69 | Medium | |
| 2 | 44 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | W07 | 1’25.409 | 0.470 | 156 | Medium |
| 3 | 3 | Daniel Ricciardo | Red Bull | RB12 | 1’26.044 | 1.105 | 87 | Medium |
| 4 | 77 | Valtteri Bottas | Williams | FW38 | 1’26.091 | 1.152 | 88 | Medium |
| 5 | 34 | Alfonso Celis | Force India | VJM09 | 1’26.298 | 1.359 | 58 | Soft |
| 6 | 22 | Jenson Button | McLaren | MP4-31 | 1’26.735 | 1.796 | 84 | Soft |
| 7 | 55 | Carlos Sainz Jnr | Toro Rosso | STR11 | 1’27.180 | 2.241 | 55 | Medium |
| 8 | 9 | Marcus Ericsson | Sauber | C34 | 1’27.555 | 2.616 | 88 | Medium |
| 9 | 94 | Pascal Wehrlein | Manor | MRT05 | 1’28.292 | 3.353 | 54 | Soft |
| 10 | 8 | Romain Grosjean | Haas | VF-16 | 1’28.399 | 3.460 | 31 | Medium |
| 11 | 30 | Jolyon Palmer | Renault | RS16 | 1’29.356 | 4.417 | 37 | Medium |
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Eggry (@eggry)
22nd February 2016, 17:31
I’ve never seen this amount of mileage in opening day. Just mega. Anyway, every teams managed reasonable amount of laps, so it’s safe to say reliability of PU has been significantly improved, especially Honda and Renault.
Albrecht
22nd February 2016, 19:06
Rosberg did 157 laps on opening day last year.
dam00r (@dam00r)
22nd February 2016, 19:31
On the shorter circuit, Jerez
Mijail (@mijail)
22nd February 2016, 19:39
In Jerez (Shorter track) so 30km less thab Hamilton
Kgn11
22nd February 2016, 20:07
He did say mileage not laps and the article even stated it was 30km more than what Nico did last year.
uan (@uan)
22nd February 2016, 21:52
Hamilton went about 4% further than Rosberg last year – not exactly destroying the previous amount of mileage completed. It depends on how Merc tests – are they going for sheer mileage, or are they looking at things per lap. If it’s by laps, then they must have been doing a similar program as they did last year.
We also know that the Merc PU is ultra-reliable from last year. Not surprising to see the same numbers this year. It’s more interesting to see the McLaren-Honda get in 84 laps and Red Bull to get in 87 laps. Those are good numbers for engines that had major reliability issues last year.
BJ (@beejis60)
23rd February 2016, 1:35
@uan It’s already been discussed that Merc are going for mileage this preseason.
Ian McDonald (@imcdnzl)
22nd February 2016, 17:32
Ouch for Renault – I wonder whether driver or car or both!
Stephen Crowsen (@drycrust)
23rd February 2016, 1:19
Yes, not desirable. I would have expected better, especially as Red Bull have got the same engine.
Oh … here we go, if you check out Keith’s article on the RS16 you will find a list of excuses, e.g. 2015 car and 2016 engine, had to make changes to accommodate the new engine, 2016 chassis on the way, insufficient downforce, need to update the suspension, need to do aero updates, etc.
https://www.racefans.net/2016/02/22/renault-rs16-first-pictures-revealed/
michaeldobson13 (@michaeldobson13)
22nd February 2016, 17:53
Vettel’s time is only 3 tenths of last years pole lap (with the same tyre compound), and faster than his time.
Also, Manor is nearly 3 seconds up on their qualifying effort (although if the Autosport page is to be believed, they were on the soft compund, but still…)
anon
23rd February 2016, 5:39
@michaeldobson13, I really wouldn’t read anything into the comparison with the pole position times from last year, because teams have, for the best part of the 15 or so years that they’ve been using the Circuit de Catalunya for testing, consistently set faster times during pre-season testing than during the race itself (for example, back in 2004 Schumacher’s best time in pre-season testing was around half a second better than his pole position lap, so it definitely isn’t a trend that is specific to the current regulation package).
Essentially, it seems to be the case that the conditions at the circuit are more conducive to setting faster lap times during the winter test season than the race itself, which is perhaps in part due to the teams being able to reduce the cooling apertures due to the lower ambient temperatures and therefore cutting drag.
AliceD (@aliced)
23rd February 2016, 6:25
I would think that the reason the times for testing is so much faster than race and race qualifying times is that they push the engine harder in testing than racing as it has to last longer when racing. Just shows you how much they have to hold back in racing, which is a real shame.
David Not Coulthard (@davidnotcoulthard)
23rd February 2016, 11:53
@aliced That’s still unproven though…..and to me makes less sense than Anon’s explanation (teams holding back like that in a competition in which they put the tyre chamber above Pirelli’s reccomendations? Errr…….I doubt it)
Arrows98 (@arrows98)
22nd February 2016, 19:15
84 laps without the Honda blowing up even once? is that a record??? ;)
in all seriousness, without looking too much into a single day of testing, I have a feeling McLaren is now where the aimed to be at the end of testing last year: a car that is somewhat reliable, has an average pace, hopefully good enough to fight for points on most tracks.
this is truly Year 1 for McHonda! :)
except now they are 2 years behind everybody… :/
Arrows98 (@arrows98)
22nd February 2016, 19:16
*they aimed
David Not Coulthard (@davidnotcoulthard)
23rd February 2016, 11:57
@arrows98
Nope http://newsonf1.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1694&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15
(96 is way below what Team Brackley managed in theis year’s Day 1 testing though)
:P
David Not Coulthard (@davidnotcoulthard)
23rd February 2016, 11:58
http://newsonf1.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=64153#64153
dan
22nd February 2016, 19:23
Reliability looks great again. I certainly am glad 25 points is huge to keep making up.
Alan (@alan77)
22nd February 2016, 19:25
The McLaren unable to set a time or something?
jsw11984 (@jarred-walmsley)
22nd February 2016, 19:42
Button was 6th – 1’26.735
Philip (@philipgb)
22nd February 2016, 19:45
Either Alfonso Celis is pretty handy for a pay test driver or that Force India is potentially quite quick.
faulty (@faulty)
22nd February 2016, 20:33
Hopefully we’ll have a competition in the midfield this year. The more, the merrier.
Jorge Olivier
23rd February 2016, 3:24
I thought the same. Usually he sucks so hopefully that’s a very fast car.
BasCB (@bascb)
23rd February 2016, 6:14
or they just drained the tanks a bit more than the competition to get a nice time on the clocks @philipgb
Todfod (@todfod)
22nd February 2016, 20:19
Pretty impressed with Mclaren. They managed to get 80+ laps in without any failure on the PU side.
Hopefully, they can keep this up during the test, and turn in to a genuine mid field team this year
JackySteeg (@jackysteeg)
22nd February 2016, 20:24
What circuit layout do they use for testing at Barcelona? Is it the current one or the old one, with the sweeping final corner instead of that chicane? I just can’t believe that with it being day 1 some teams are lapping faster than they were at the Grand Prix last year.
Kingshark (@kingshark)
22nd February 2016, 20:28
@jackysteeg
Why not? I’d be surprised if they weren’t faster than last year. They are running the normal Barcelona circuit (with the chicane) btw.
James N
23rd February 2016, 10:40
I wouldn’t be surprised if this was the Championship running order by the end of the year… maybe swapping Manor and Haas…