F1 2016 pre-season testing

[f1316]

FYI Toto (I think it was) said Merc wouldn't use SS or US at this test. I think that's kinda funny because how will they have any data on which to base Montreal tyre choices?

Anyway, don't expect to see it. The Soft/Medium comparisons will have to do - Nico making a bit of a gap (0.6) to Ferrari on best medium times but softs are super close right now.

[smhasan7]

Raikkonen has posted a stunning time of 1.23.009 on Softs which is 2 steps harder than ultra softs and about half a tenth up on Rosberg's time. Have we underestimated Ferrari?

Update: Kimi also smashed the fastest time of testing so far with a 1.22.765 on Ultra softs... but the time on softs is really eye catching!

Cannot say anything, until we know amount of fuel... Nevertheless it is possitive.
He had some fuel left, because he made more laps, but the lap after 1:23.009 was more then second slower.
I am more suprised that time on ultrasoft is so slow (I would expect 1,5s faster compared to soft, once again, the may be running with more fuel with ultra soft.)

Kimi's s2 was really poor on US compared to S, ever so slightly better where he managed a much better time in S1 and S3 which means he probably did a mistake so there is more time in the car, probably. Having said that these tyres as already mentioned aren't for this circuit and with aero loads and speeds, it's killing it. The time on softs was faster than what Rosberg managed in his quali simulation the other day. So encouraging.

Still waiting for that elusive new aero package, it's the penultimate day of testing

[Big Mangalhit]

Raikkonen has posted a stunning time of 1.23.009 on Softs which is 2 steps harder than ultra softs and about half a tenth up on Rosberg's time. Have we underestimated Ferrari?

Update: Kimi also smashed the fastest time of testing so far with a 1.22.765 on Ultra softs... but the time on softs is really eye catching!

Cannot say anything, until we know amount of fuel... Nevertheless it is possitive.
He had some fuel left, because he made more laps, but the lap after 1:23.009 was more then second slower.
I am more suprised that time on ultrasoft is so slow (I would expect 1,5s faster compared to soft, once again, the may be running with more fuel with ultra soft.)

Kimi US lap was not going full beans. he did 1m22.765s and the next lap was 1m23.4s. So he still had battery left for a second one. A qualy setup would drain all the battery for next lap

[Big Mangalhit]

Sorry my autocorrect doesn't like me writing quali instead of qualification. That doesn't explain the mistake I did using darin instead of drain.

[PhillipM]

The short runs don't tel you anything, you don't know how hard they're pushing the tyres or how much fuel they have onboard - Raikkonen's tyre looked in pretty good shape in the pits for example which is not what you'd expect of two flying laps of US on this track if he was pushing hard, so there's more to come out of the car. But there is out of the rest too and you never know how much.
The only rough idea you can get of performance in testing is the long runs, where you know they must have at least x fuell and you can watch degradation if they're anywhere near where they need to be running - and that's where Merc looks scary.

[Mr.G]

What's nice is that Kimi set this time with "old" airo...

well today is the penultimate day of testing and the only thing we saw aero wise perhaps was the 'halo' joke.

so i guess this is what we're going to see in Melbourne. Nonetheless the time on softs was really encouraging. Would have wiped a few smirks off the Merc garage

Still they will have new wings soon or later, also the side pods I think and maybe s-duck and monkey seat...

[snowy]

Sorry my autocorrect doesn't like me writing quali instead of qualification. That doesn't explain the mistake I did using darin instead of drain.

I had predictive text enabled on my phone once...
I don't know what I'm thinking, so have no idea how a machine could possibly know what I'm about to say.

[snowy]

I get the feeling that the other teams are looking at Mercedes and thinking: "what the bloody hell are they doing all those frigging laps for!?" "They're just going round in circles, for crikes sake."

[snowy]

The start of a race simulation for Hulkenberg perhaps:

Hulkenberg (S) OUT 1:30.1 1:30.7 1:31.0 1:31.4 1:31.9 1:32.5 1:33.1 1:33.1 BOX

[snowy]

Perhaps not his come back out on another set of softs...

[snowy]

Massa (H) 1:26.9 1:27.2 1:27.6 1:27.9 1:28.0 1:28.6 1:28.5 1:28.6 1:28.6 1:28.9 1:29.1 1:29.1 1:29.3 1:29.6 1:47.6 1:45.8 1:29.4 1:29.6 BOX

Raikkonen (S) OUT 1:29.3 1:29.6 1:30.0 1:29.9 1:31.8 BOX

[digitalrurouni]

I get the feeling that the other teams are looking at Mercedes and thinking: "what the bloody hell are they doing all those frigging laps for!?" "They're just going round in circles, for crikes sake."

The teams ain't the only one. I mean sure they are correlating aero data and trying new parts but now it just seems a bit ludicrous. I guess we will never know the thinking behind all those laps. But what I don't get is why not put on the soft and the supersoft tires. If I remember right the W0X cars never really liked the softer compounds did they? Are they banking on the fact that they accept that as their Achilles heel and they would rather just optimize for the medium compound since that will be their preferred rubber of choice?

[A-Bap]

Massa (H) 1:26.9 1:27.2 1:27.6 1:27.9 1:28.0 1:28.6 1:28.5 1:28.6 1:28.6 1:28.9 1:29.1 1:29.1 1:29.3 1:29.6 1:47.6 1:45.8 1:29.4 1:29.6 BOX

Raikkonen (S) OUT 1:29.3 1:29.6 1:30.0 1:29.9 1:31.8 BOX

Massa: Impressive for him and for Williams.

[GPR-A duplicate2]

Wehrlein in a Manor does 1m25.206s on Super Soft. That would be somewhere around around 1m24.6xx on Ultra Soft. Some Extrapolation I am doing here. Last year, the fastest manor ended up 6 seconds behind the Pole Sitter Nico Rosberg in Abu Dhabi. IF (a testing IF), today's time on SS (extra polated US) is the maximum that Manor can do and if they still are 6 seconds behind the Mercedes (quite possible), then Mercedes should be able to do a 1m18.6xx on Ultra Soft.
Note: Wehrlein being the rookie, might be still finding his feet in this new car and in the same situation, a more experienced Will Stevens could have been a few tenths faster.

[ME4ME]

Raikkonen has posted a stunning time of 1.23.009 on Softs which is 2 steps harder than ultra softs and about half a tenth up on Rosberg's time. Have we underestimated Ferrari?

Update: Kimi also smashed the fastest time of testing so far with a 1.22.765 on Ultra softs... but the time on softs is really eye catching!

According to Pirellis twitter it was actually the supersofts, not the softs for that 1:23.