Raikkonen fastest on quiet first day of testing

The first day of pre-season testing is in the history books as the chequered flag has fallen in Jerez, with Kimi Raikkonen’s Ferrari topping the time sheets and total laps completed.

Mercedes, Red Bull Racing and Force India kicked the day off with the launches of their new 2014 challengers, whilst Caterham and Williams launches followed in the afternoon. Far from the fanfare that was expected of car launches in the past, all cars were launched in the pit lane before immediately taking to the track for the first runs of the year.

However, the actual testing of the cars got off to a slower start than expected as a new era of turbo-charged V6 engines began today. Whilst some teams were slow to get on track, Lotus and Marussia were not even present, though Marussia is at least thought to be on the way.

Red Bull, McLaren, Williams and Caterham opted to remain in their respective garages until the afternoon session, meaning the mornings’ activities saw mostly Mercedes and Toro Rosso put laps on their cars, whilst Ferrari, Force India and Sauber made brief appearances but did no more than 2 laps.

Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen and Force India’s Sergio Perez were forced to stop on track though, with only Ferrari managing to make a return appearance for an installation lap before the midday break.

This left Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton to set the pace early in the day with a flying lap of 1:27.820 ahead of Jean-Eric Vergne in the Toro Rosso who found himself over 8 seconds down on the Mercedes.

Lewis Hamilton would complete 18 laps before his first day of testing came to an early end. Suffering a high speed front wing failure, Hamilton was pitched into the barriers at Turn 1. Though Hamilton walled away from the crash unhurt, the team would soon confirm that damage was enough to stop their test for the first day.

Despite his morning crash, Hamilton spoke highly of the new Mercedes W05, telling Autosport:

“For me it’s an incredibly positive start to be the first car out on track and completing a good number of laps.

"Of course, it’s unfortunate to end the day early when everyone has worked so hard and we had looked like easily completing the most mileage of anyone here today.”

As lunch came to end, Caterham finally fired up their new challenger for the season, with Williams following shortly thereafter. It would be Caterham who would break cover first though, revealing the radical design of the CT05 to the world. Initially scheduled to reveal the car before the morning run session started, a fault with the car delayed the teams launch.

As the afternoon session got underway, six of the nine drivers and teams present got out onto the track, whilst Jenson Button (McLaren), Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull Racing) and Valterri Bottas (Williams) were yet to be seen in their respective cars.

Marcus Ericsson, Caterham’s newest recruit, was charged with taking the CT05 out for the new cars’ first laps, and joined Kimi Raikkonen on track to start the afternoon. Raikkonen completed a four lap run on track before bringing the Ferrari back to the garage, and Ericcson was joined on track by Vergne and Perez. The session came to another early stop though as Vergne’s Toro Rosso stopped on track and the session was red flagged.

The Toro Rosso was quickly recovered, leaving just over an hour and 15 minutes left on the clock for the first day of testing. Force India took the track immediately, though Sergio Perez would complete just one installation lap before returning to the pits. With just over an hour left on the day, Perez was yet to record a flying lap.

Williams were the next team to give eyes around the world a look at their new car. At approximately 3:03pm local time, Bottas emerged in the Williams FW36, completing just one installation lap before returning to the Williams garage for the afternoon.

The remainder of the afternoon saw Kimi Raikkonen put more miles on the Ferrari F14T and Bottas complete a second run in the Williams before once more returning to the garage. The track then went quiet and with just over 20 minutes remaining in the days’ first test session, the rain began to fall.

Pirelli have a scheduled ‘wet tyre running’ day planned for Friday of this week, meaning there would be little action on track as teams were unwilling to risk their new cars on the yet untested wet surface.

Force India and Red Bull were the exception to the rule. With just twelve minutes remaining on the day, Sergio Perez and Sebastian Vettel took to the track. It would be Red Bull Racing’s first appearance on track for the day.

A few minutes later, Bottas would take to the track once more in the Williams, completing a flying lap that put the Finn third fastest on the day. As the chequered flag fell on the first test of the 2014 season, McLaren, Marussia and Lotus are yet to complete any laps in their 2014 challengers.

McLaren confirmed at the end of the day that an electrical fault kept the team off track today, whilst Marussia have released a statement informing the media that their car has left Banbury and is en route to Jerez. The team are still unsure as to whether they will get track time on Wednesday.

The following laps and times have been completed as of the end of day one:

Day 2 of the Formula 1 pre-season test commences tomorrow, January 29th 2014.