Mercedes duo Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton lauded the squad’s reliability after the pair combined to amass the most mileage of any team on the first day of the second test.
Bottas piloted the W09 during the morning session at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, before Hamilton took over for the afternoon, the pair racking up 177 laps, six more than Ferrari.
Bottas evaluated tyre-dependent set-up changes while Hamilton simulated recovering from a variety of potential sensor failures, as well as the usual assessment of aerodynamic updates.
Bottas finished his morning session two-tenths of a second behind Sebastian Vettel, which remained the benchmark for the remainder of the day, as Hamilton placed fourth.
“The conditions today were much better than last week and we're all really happy about that,” he said.
“We got lots of valuable data today. This morning we focused on medium to long runs, trying different mechanical setups of the car.
“We keep discovering more about the new car, learning how it reacts to different settings. We did more than 80 laps – so more than a race distance, a really good mileage.
“The car was very reliable, I really enjoyed being back in the car and I'm looking forward to continuing tomorrow.”
Reigning World Champion Hamilton echoed Bottas’ sentiments as he continued preparations for his title defence
“It's been a good day,” he surmised. “We've got through everything we needed and put good mileage on the car – it’s been productive.
“Overall it's been a good start to the second test although there is not a whole lot to say at this moment.
“We have not worked too much on fine-tuning the set-up as we're mostly still gathering information. In the next couple of days, once we get into the long-runs and some shorter qualifying-style runs, we will get a better idea of where the car is.”
