Barcelona I, day 3: Hulkenberg quickest as Mercedes splits running

Nico Hulkenberg set the fastest time of the third day of the opening pre-season test as Mercedes opted to split its running following marathon outings for its drivers across the first two days of running in Barcelona.

With both Lewis Hamilton and Lewis Hamilton posting more than 150 laps each on their opening outings at the wheel of the W07, the title-defending team opted to run Robserg in the morning today, with Hamilton taking over in the afternoon. And between them the pair logged 162 laps, with Rosberg posting 74 laps in the morning and Hamilton totalling 88 in the afternoon. The German recorded a best time of 1:26.084 that left him fifth on the timesheet, while the Briton’s 1:26.421 saw him finish the day in eighth place. Both drivers used the medium tyre for their best times.

Hulkenberg, meanwhile, set his table-topping lap of 1:23.110 on the supersoft tyre. The time was the second best of the week so far, with only Sebastian Vettel’s 1:22.810 from Tuesday, set on the ultrasoft tyre, being quicker.

Haas’ strong start to its Formula One continued as Romain Grosjean took second spot on the timesheet. The Frenchman moved to the soft tyre late in the afternoon and posted a lap of 1:25.874 to finish 2.5s adrift of Hulkenberg on a day when eight of the 12 runners concentrated on running with Pirelli’s medium compound rubber. Grosjean also posted a solid 82 laps to put a further gloss on Haas’ week so far.

Ferrari’s Kimi Räikkönen was quickest on the medium tyre, with the Finn finishing third with a time of 1:25.977. It wasn’t a completely smooth day for the Italian squad, however, as it largely spent the morning session garage-bound, running fuel system checks after the Finn encountered a problem.

When Räikkönen did take to the track he put in 78 laps of the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya.

Fourth place in the session went to Kevin Magnussen, making his debut for the Renault team. After a troubled first two days for the French squad in which Jolyon Palmer completed just 79 laps in total, today’s outing was much more profitable, with Magnussen getting through 111 laps on his way to a best time of 1:26.014, set on the soft tyre.

It wasn’t a completely reliable session, however, as in the afternoon Magnussen stopped on the pit straight, bringing out the red flags. He later stopped again at the end of the pit lane.

With Rosberg fifth, sixth place went to Toro Rosso’s Carlos Sainz. The Spaniard also posted the day’s biggest single-driver lap total, getting through 161 tours of the circuit. Sainz was the first to bring out the red flags when he stopped just after the pit exit after his team had failed to correctly attach a wheel to his car.

Daniil Kvyat finished in ninth place, behind Hamilton, but for the second day in succession Red Bull Racing were hampered by reliability issues. Daniel Ricciardo’s session was ended early yesterday when the team detected a technical issue and despite overnight work to rectify the problem, a recurrence again forced the Milton Keynes to stop early.

Jenson Button also failed to complete his day’s running as a hydraulic leak ended McLaren’s day early, while new Manor driver Rio Haryanto set the slowest time - 5.1s off the pace.