Barcelona II, day 1: Grosjean quickest for Lotus Renault

On a much warmer and summer like day in Barcelona, the final winter test session of 2012 got underway this morning at the Circuit de Catalunya giving teams on last 4 day week to gather the final data needed for their new cars before the Formula 1 season kicks off at the end of this month in Australia.

And despite Jenson Button’s McLaren MP4-27 sitting at the top of the time sheets for most of the day, it was a late afternoon run by Lotus F1’s Romain Grosjean that would put the Frenchman in first position as Day 1 came to a close.

After having to leave the second test in Barcelona on Day 1 last week due to chassis and suspension problems with the E20, Lotus F1 had an impressive day on their return to testing. Not only would Romain Grosjean finish P1 for the day with a quickest time of 1:23.252, but he did it in just 73 laps, late in the day, and on a set of Pirelli’s Soft tyre compound. Lotus will be pleased with their return to the track, with no reported problems or issues today.

Lap times would be relatively slow this afternoon as teams choose to focus their attention on longer runs instead of quick runs. Most quick times were set this morning, as is becoming standard practice over the test days now.

Interestingly, Pirelli came to Barcelona for the final test with a secret style motorhome and two sets of unmarked tyres. We would soon be informed that the unmarked tyres were ‘back-up’ trye compounds. These tyres will be supplied to the Formula 1 teams if there is ever a disaster at the Pirelli factory which would affect the supply during a race weekend. All teams have the opportunity to run these tyres over the 4 total test days.

Jenson Button would have to settle with second place today in the McLaren MP4-27. 0.258 seconds off the pace of Grosjean, McLaren would complete just 64 laps today, the second lowest number of laps of the ten total runners today.

Sergio Perez, in the Sauber C31, had another strong day for the team, finishing in third position overall on the time sheets and clocking 118 laps on the car.

Mark Webber in the Red Bull Racing RB8 was another driver to register over 100 laps today, getting to 102 before the end of the session. Although improving his personal lap time but a tenth this afternoon, Webber would end Day 1 in fourth position. Interestingly though, on a longer run this afternoon on the hard compound tyres, Webbers lap time would decrease by a full second in just 15 laps, showing excellent pace and balance from the RB8. It also gave the other teams some excellent data collection as they looked on.

Nico Rosberg in the Mercedes AMG F1 W03 would finish as the highest lapping car today, registering a full 128 – more than twice the length of a full Grand Prix at the Circuit de Catalunya. Huge lap totals have become a thing of common practice for the team, who are seemingly taking more data from the car than others around them. There would be no reliability of reported issues from the W03 throughout the day either.

Jean Eric Vergne would place sixth overall in the Toro Rosso and was another man who would log over 100 laps today, finishing with 113. Paul di Resta and the VJM05 were right behind in seventh place, falling just short of 100 laps today. Force India chose to focus their day’s efforts on aerodynamics tests and data collection.

Having spent a good portion of the afternoon in the pit garage, and with the team also focusing on aerodynamic tests, Felipe Massa would finish eighth on the time sheets for Day 1 in his Ferrari F2012 eventually logging 105 laps.

Vitaly Petrov, in the Caterham F1 CT-01 in place of Heikki Kovalainen who came down ill this morning, completed the second highest number of laps for the day, registering 123 in total – just five behind the Mercedes W03 of Nico Rosberg, and demonstrating good strength and reliability from the Caterham car which suffered from numerous technical faults at last week’s test. Petrov would end the day second to last of the ten runners, but with a quickest lap time of 1:24.876, Caterham would find themselves just 1.624 seconds off the pace set by the Lotus E20.

Pastor Maldonado in the Williams F1 FW34 would round the field off with just 58 laps to his name and over two seconds off the pace of Romain Grosjean.

Day 1 Session times and total lap numbers can be seen below. Day 2 of testing in Barcelona starts tomorrow at 09:00 CET.

Follow me on Twitter - @IrvineF1