Pietro Fittipaldi, Haas, Bahrain International Circuit, 2022

2022 F1 pre-season testing day four in pictures

F1 pictures

Posted on

| Written by

Pictures from the first day of testing for the 2022 F1 season at the Bahrain International Circuit.

F1 pictures

View more F1 pictures

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

Got a potential story, tip or enquiry? Find out more about RaceFans and contact us here.

16 comments on “2022 F1 pre-season testing day four in pictures”

  1. Wow those side pods are ugly!

    1. Lamborghini 291 sprung to my mind

  2. The Mercedes is so ugly now, it’s enough to turn you into a Red Bull fan! Well maybe not.

    Seriously though, I hope the change does not make them a lot faster than anyone else. Just for the sake of the racing.

    1. Honestly, I hope they find it illegal just because of how ugly it is.

      Its hands down the worst looking F1 car in at least a decade. We can only pray it’s either not that quick or is found illegal, before all F1 cars look like this.

      1. Absolutely. It should be banned just on aesthetic grounds. Horrible compared to how attractive some of the cars are this year.

      2. It certainly doesn’t look like the Mercedes is ahead of everybody else. The car looked very nervous at times and Hamilton’s longer runs didn’t look particularly good either (though they were definitely running very conservative engine modes and probably more fuel than i.e. the Ferrari).
        So far it doesn’t look like these basically non-existent sidepods are a big game changer.

        1. @srga91

          The car looked very nervous at times

          Not necessarily a bad sign: it may indicate a lot of development potential.

    2. …I like them better now, they removed that faux inlet and now they are like Williams but flipped sideways. Dorilton is favourite car at the moment. I can’t see how any of these cars look ugly than the best cars of 09-21.

  3. I might be in the minority here but I think the Mercedes is a really good looking car now. Looks more fighter jet than car. Really innovative and I have to take my hat to the engineers who managed to package everything in

  4. I say this every year but why is the testing not on YouTube, let everyone have a chance to see the cars in action and get new fans excited enough to purchase whatever subscription their country demands.

    1. Testing is a boring affair. Like for devotees it might be interesting as background noise during work or whatever it is you do during your day, but it’s utterly boring for someone who doesn’t care about Formula 1 (yet).

      Reeling in new fans with testing seems highly unlikely.

    2. @emu55 Broadcast contracts & other agreements that are in place wouldn’t allow them to.

      In the past testing wouldn’t have been part of the various commercial deals but I think 10 or so years ago it was decided that any official test that I think it’s 5 or more teams take part in is considered an official session in which all the usual commercial deals are in place.

      Plus as @sjaakfoo says testing is quite a dull thing to watch with a lot of downtime & periods with only 1 car on track doing slower runs so it’s unlikely that having that on Youtube will do much to get newer fans that excited. Even some of the most diehard fans seem to be finding todays running quite dull to watch based on what i’ve seen elsewhere.

  5. A design that hurts the eyes, visual pollution.

  6. I agree YouTube please get it so us die hard fans can watch. Me thinks mercs are running super conservative they know what they have they will probably test the limits on the last day. Just to put the fear of God in everyone else. Especially Horner. Hehehehe.

  7. Haas looking much better already without stupid russian flag :]

Comments are closed.