Pre-season testing Day 1: 59 laps for Charles Leclerc in morning session. 59 laps for Charles in the morning session.

Daniel Ricciardo posted his best time just over the halfway mark during the four-hour morning session, setting a 1m32.203s on hard C2 tyres in his McLaren-Mercedes MCL35B.

Despite the rough conditions, the morning session was relatively incident-free. Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc caused the only red flag with 10 minutes to go, parking his new Ferrari SF21 in the first sector after an apparent mechanical failure in the run up to Turn One.

In the opening stages, Charles Leclerc was the first driver to post a reasonable time with a 1m37.481s, soon bested by former teammate Vettel’s 1m36.367s in the Aston Martin AMR21 and then Raikkonen’s 1m34.686s in the Alfa Romeo.

Charles Leclerc completed the morning session with 59 laps at the Bahrain Circuit, with a personal best time of 1’33.242, almost one second slower than Daniel Ricciardo’s best lap time. Charles will now hand over to Carlos Sainz for the four hours of the afternoon session.

Gasly was the most productive driver of the bunch, leading the lap chart with 74 tours.

Testing continues at 15:00 local time for another four-hour session, although predicted sandstorms are expected to worsen conditions in the afternoon.

Formula 1 teams get two more days of testing on Saturday and Sunday ahead of March 28’s season-opener at the same venue.