How F1 testing unfolded

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Ferrari say they are lagging behind rivals Mercedes and Red Bull at the halfway point of pre-season testing.

The admission from team boss Mattia Binotto came as Sebastian Vettel suffered the first mechanical failure of testing with an engine failure.

Binotto said: "I am not as optimistic as last year so it means the others are faster than us at the moment.

"How much faster it's really difficult to judge. We will go through all the data."

The first of two three-day pre-season tests came to an end on Friday at Barcelona's Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya with Mercedes drivers Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton topping the timesheets.

Bottas set the fastest time of the winter, 0.8 seconds quicker than Hamilton and well over a second quicker than anyone else managed.

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1. Valtteri Bottas 1:15.732 (Mercedes) laps - 65 (ultra-softs)
2. Lewis Hamilton 1:16.516 (Mercedes) laps - 73 (ultra-softs)
3. Esteban Ocon 1:17.102 (Renault) laps - 76 (softs)
4. Lance Stroll 1:17.338 (Racing Point) laps - 116 (softs)
5. Daniil Kvyat 1:17.427 (Alpha Tauri) laps - 62 (softs)
6. Antonio Giovinazzi 1:17.469 (Alfa Romeo) laps - 152 (ultra-softs)
7. Daniel Ricciardo 1:17.574 (Renault) laps - 93 (softs)
8. Max Verstappen 1:17.636 (Red Bull) laps - 86 (hards)
9. Pierre Gasly 1:17.783 (Alpha Tauri) laps - 59 (hards)
10. Alex Albon 1:18.154 (Red Bull) laps - 83 (hards)
11. Carlos Sainz 1:18.274 (McLaren) laps - 76 (hards)
12. Romain Grosjean 1:18.380 (Haas) laps - 48 (mediums)
13. Sebastian Vettel 1:18.384 (Ferrari) laps - 100 (mediums)
14. Lando Norris 1:18.454 (McLaren) laps - 49 (mediums)
15. Nicholas Latifi 1:19.004 (Williams) laps - 72 (mediums)
16. Kevin Magnussen 1:19.709 (Haas) laps - 4 (hards)

Helmet decisions for George Russell.

I like the one on the left.

Thank you for all of your suggestions - they have all been superb!

Alan RichardsonCopyright: Alan Richardson

PritskiCopyright: Pritski

Gareth HughesCopyright: Gareth Hughes

Another driver who has been happy with what he has achieved from the first week of testing is Max Verstappen.

No other driver has managed to beat him in terms of laps completed on a single day. The Red Bull did 168 rotations on Wednesday - pretty impressive.

Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto has acknowledged the Scuderia is trailing Red Bull and Mercedes but also says the Ferrari SF1000 is still being sorted out.

“It's difficult to say because we're not looking at performance yet - we've not optimised the car, that will be clearer next week,” he said when asked if Ferrari is where he expected it to be.

The new Ferrari was designed with greater flexibility in the setup than last year’s SF90 and Binotto revealed the team had not tried extreme setups on the car or optimising the car in various conditions and setups.

"It's about being ready to have a good picture of the car and understand what's going wrong, if anything, and addressing it,” he said. “I don’t think it's been an issue through the first days, it's a matter of knowing and understanding the new car and the new package.”

Carlos Sainz appears happy with his first week of testing.

1. Valtteri Bottas 1:15.732 (Mercedes) laps - 65 (ultra-softs)
2. Lewis Hamilton 1:16.516 (Mercedes) laps - 56 (ultra-softs)
3. Esteban Ocon 1:17.102 (Renault) laps - 76 (softs)

The Renault driver is back on his way again, but had a small scare at Turn 13, on only his second lap on the soft tyres.

Adore the Shadow - fantastic car!

Russ OtwayCopyright: Russ Otway

MatCopyright: Mat

Arno KenisCopyright: Arno Kenis

The screens are up as the Haas mechanics repair the car that Kevin Magnussen crashed.

Meanwhile, many of the other garages have no cars in them as the drivers are piling up the laps.

Dan KnutsonCopyright: Dan Knutson

Hamilton is back on the medium tyres.

He has 40 minutes to try and better Bottas' time.

Still 0.784s separates the team-mates with Valtteri having the edge.

Bottas must really like this track, as he also holds the out-right lap record. He did a 1:15.406 to take pole position in 2019.

Ian Mellors: Well done FIA for allowing DAS for this season, all too often innovation is stifled just because Ferrari/Renault have not thought of it. DAS is banned for next season, but not toe adjustment, it could be allowed if it was automatic, say operated via the steering input.

Gerard Boyd: With the first GP just weeks away what chance do other teams have to develop and fully test (as Mercedes are doing right now) a new steering system for mid-season say? You may as well write-off the season with that plan. But Mercedes? Yeah, on you go?

Sven: All this talk about F1 banning things being contradictory to being innovative. It isn't. Sure, it is quite a clever development which I am very interested in but that doesn't mean it is necessarily in the spirit of the rules. Think back to Renault's mass damper of mid 00s

There's only 45 minutes left to the final test session of the week.

F1Copyright: F1

Some of the teams in this session will be undertaking a race simulation run.

66 laps of the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya amounts to a full race distance.

Good news for Ricciardo fans - he should be out soon.