Scuderia Ferrari Monegasque driver Charles Leclerc led the early running today at the Bahrain International Circuit, as the final 2022 Formula 1 pre-season testing session got underway on Thursday.
After completing the most laps than any team and featuring towards the top of the timesheets in the first pre-season testing session which took place two weeks ago at the Circuit de Catalunya in Barcelona, the Maranello team continued to show further early progress with the F1-75 car.
Charles Leclerc was able to set several laps fast enough for the first place, gradually improving to a fastest lap time of 1:34.531 shortly before the two-hour mark, having gone purple in all three sectors with the yellow-marked Medium C3 tyre compound.
And it was Charles Leclerc who finished the morning session with the fastest time to start the Bahrain test in a strong position. Alex Albon and Sebastian Vettel finished second and third but the big story of the opening morning is Mercedes’ radical new sidepod design, which has turned heads in the paddock and seemingly (although they deny this) angered Red Bull.
Mexican driver Sergio Perez completed the most laps of the morning with 69.
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While most teams completed their scheduled programme for this first day of testing in Bahrain, Lando Norris was the only driver who did not reach double lap figures by the halfway point of the morning session, with McLaren investigating an issue on the car which limited their laps this morning.
Day one – session one final timesheet
Position Driver Team Time Tyre Laps
1 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 1:34.531 C3 63
2 Alex Albon Williams 1:35.070 C4 53
3 Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin 1:35.706 C3 37
4 Sergio Perez Red Bull 1:36.247 C2 69
5 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:36.365 C3 61
6 Esteban Ocon Alpine 1:36.768 C2 42
7 Guanyu Zhou Alfa Romeo 1:37.164 C3 53
8 Lando Norris McLaren 1:37.580 C2 21
9 Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri 1:37.888 C2 44
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