Sebastian Vettel kept Ferrari on top on the final day of pre-season testing in Barcelona, with the Italian outfit topping five of the eight days.
Vettel mirrored team-mate Kimi Raikkonen’s Thursday programme by running an installation lap with the prototype ‘Halo’ device installed on his car, before he got down to the business of testing with a race simulation in the afternoon.
However during the morning, the German bolted on a set of red super-soft tyres to post his best lap, a 1:22.852, to finish more than two-tenths clear of Toro Rosso’s Carlos Sainz with 142 laps under his belt.
Sainz set his best lap on the quicker ultra-soft tyre and completed 131 laps in total, three more than third-placed Felipe Massa who finished seventh-tenths adrift in his Williams.
Sergio Perez could only manage 60 laps before his day came to an early end when his Force India crawled to a stop at Turn 12 with three hours remaining on the clock. He failed to reappear after the red flag.
A second red flag was caused by none other than Lewis Hamilton, who stopped his Mercedes on the start/finish straight just before lunch. With Nico Rosberg taking over in the afternoon and a quick turnaround, it’s likely the team were running a fuel test and the Briton simply drained the tank.
The team completed 139 laps between its two drivers.
Hamilton ended up fifth fastest whilst Rosberg rounded off the table in last, having focused on longer runs during his afternoon session.
Daniel Ricciardo was sixth for Red Bull, finishing ahead of McLaren’s Jenson Button and Renault’s Jolyon Palmer. The Renault rookie was plagued by yet more issues, limiting his running to 90 laps.
Haas chose to switch its drivers in the final hour, with Romain Grosjean, tenth, handing his car over to Esteban Gutierrez. The Mexican completed 25 laps.
Manor’s Rio Haryanto was last but one, posting a lap of 1:25.899 to end up three seconds down.
Pos | Driver | Team | Time | Gap | Tyre | Laps |
1 | S. Vettel | Ferrari | 1:22.852 | 142 | ||
2 | C. Sainz | Toro Rosso | 1:23.134 | 0.282 | 131 | |
3 | F. Massa | Williams | 1:23.644 | 0.792 | 129 | |
4 | S. Perez | Force India | 1:23.721 | 0.869 | 60 | |
5 | L. Hamilton | Mercedes | 1:24.133 | 1.281 | 69 | |
6 | D. Ricciardo | Red Bull | 1:24.427 | 1.575 | 123 | |
7 | J. Button | McLaren | 1:24.714 | 1.862 | 120 | |
8 | J. Palmer | Renault | 1:24.859 | 2.007 | 90 | |
9 | M. Ericsson | Sauber | 1:25.031 | 2.179 | 132 | |
10 | R. Grosjean | Haas | 1:25.255 | 2.403 | 66 | |
11 | E. Gutierrez | Haas | 1:25.422 | 2.570 | 25 | |
12 | R. Haryanto | Manor | 1:25.899 | 3.047 | 58 | |
13 | N. Rosberg | Mercedes | 1:26.140 | 3.288 | 70 |