Rosberg fastest as Mercedes show their hand

2016 F1 season

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A quick run on soft tyres before lunch time cemented the top spot on the times sheets for Mercedes.

Nico Rosberg produced a 1’23.022 which lowered the W07’s best time so far by 1.8 seconds. It left the team just two-tenths shy of the benchmark time set by Sebastian Vettel’s Ferrari last week using ultra-soft tyres – two compounds softer than Rosberg used.

Raikkonen’s Ferrari broke down. More pictures
Williams also chose today to explore more of the FW38’s performance. Valtteri Bottas took 2.4 seconds off the team’s quickest lap from last week, but even using the new ultra-soft tyres he ended up two-tenths shy of Rosberg.

As has become their standard practice, Mercedes switched drivers at the lunch break but Lewis Hamilton did not take an opportunity to set a flying lap and ended up sixth. He was delayed only briefly by a problem which stopped him as he left the pits for his first run.

Fernando Alonso enjoyed a better day for McLaren, covering considerable ground and setting the third-quickest time. His 1’24.735 was half a second quicker than the team managed last week.

The McLaren driver was one of the first to hit the track at the beginning of the session along with Renault’s Kevin Magnussen. However neither had a trouble-free day: Alonso’s MP4-31 stopped on the pit straight shortly before lunch and Magnussen’s Renault broke down again at the end of the session. That left just a few seconds of green flag running for drivers to complete a final lap.

They weren’t the only teams with problems. Kimi Raikkonen again suffered disruption to his running after Ferrari’s SF16-H stopped at the pit exit. Rio Haryanto lost much of the morning with an oil leak on his Manor and Red Bull mechanics had to douse a minor fire at the rear of Daniil Kvyat’s car.

Felipe Nasr had a very productive first day in the new Sauber C35, managing over 100 laps. But Haas suffered a trying day curtailed by a fuel system problem.

Today’s times and laps

Pos.Car numberDriverTeamModelBest timeGapLapsTyres
16Nico RosbergMercedesW071’23.02282Soft
277Valtteri BottasWilliamsFW381’23.2290.207123Ultra-soft
314Fernando AlonsoMcLarenMP4-311’24.7351.71393Soft
47Kimi RaikkonenFerrariSF16-H1’24.8361.81472Medium
526Daniil KvyatRed BullRB121’25.0492.02769Soft
644Lewis HamiltonMercedesW071’25.0512.02990Medium
733Max VerstappenToro RossoSTR111’25.1762.154144Soft
827Nico HulkenbergForce IndiaVJM091’25.3362.314121Soft
912Felipe NasrSauberC351’25.4932.471103Soft
1020Kevin MagnussenRenaultRS161’25.7602.738119Soft
1121Esteban GutierrezHaasVF-161’26.6613.63923Medium
1288Rio HaryantoManorMRT051’27.6254.60345Soft

Teams’ best times so far

PositionTeamModelTime
1FerrariSF16-H1’22.810
2MercedesW071’23.022
3Force IndiaVJM091’23.110
4WilliamsFW381’23.229
5Red BullRB121’23.525
6McLarenMP4-311’24.735
7Toro RossoSTR111’25.176
8RenaultRS161’25.263
9SauberC351’25.493
10HaasVF-161’25.524
11ManorMRT051’25.925

2016 and 2015 lap times context

How each team’s best time so far compares to their pre-season testing times at the Circuit de Catalunya last year and their fastest lap during the Spanish Grand Prix weekend. A negative difference is quicker, positive is slower.

NB. Sauber’s best time was set with their 2015 car

2016 F1 season

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Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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46 comments on “Rosberg fastest as Mercedes show their hand”

  1. TWO whole compounds ‘harder’ than the ultra-softs Vettel used to set his time…..and lapping within just two-tenths.
    Really keen to see how Ferrari respond to this as testing progresses.

    1. A few sources reported Vettel wasnt on 100% engine mode for that run and had over 50kgs fuel.

      Whether or not these are true – reading into testing times is ALWAYS pointless (unless you’re working inside the confidentiality wall). The best thing about testing for us fans is to hear first hand reports from people (commentators we trust) track side about how specific cars are handling in specific corners.

      1. -to the point of track side commentary – most worryingly is that the Ferrari seems the 2nd best balanced car in the turns, however the problems are suggested to be correctable by the new front suspension and the new front wing expected before australia.

      2. sunny stivala
        1st March 2016, 18:45

        Mr X. What you will not hear is that today the fifth day of testing Kimi Raikkonen produced the fastest medium tyre lap so far at 1-24.836s

        1. Allison has said at lotus he was building around the mediums…. I’m sure a lot has changed since them but he’s the tire specialist of all the technical directors on the grid.

      3. Mr. X, I would say that the picture is more nuanced and that the testing times are not entirely worthless. I agree that the headline times are not especially meaningful given that there are so many variables that go into that.

        However, there have been some individuals who have been able to get hold of the times when teams have been simulating race stints, from which it is possible to tease out some useful information on potential relative pace and degradation rates (for example, the data seems to confirm that Ferrari have probably been pushing their car harder than their rivals in the first test).
        That said, Red Bull do seem to be one of the more difficult teams to judge – most of their longer stints have included constant speed laps for aero correlation testing, so it is very difficult to judge their potential race pace.

  2. i dont understand the last graph. It suggests that most teams were way quicker in 2016 testing than the 2015 spanish gp weekend, but only a little bit quicker than 2015 testing (months before the spanish gp…) so the teams got SLOWER between 2015 testing and the spanish gp weekend??? that doesn’t make sense.

    1. Liam McShane (@)
      1st March 2016, 17:52

      Remember at the GP they are limited by the medium and hard tyre (i think they were the compounds used) whearas they can use any compound they like during testing.

    2. The track is historically faster when it’s colder as well. Year in and year out testing times are usually quicker then that seasons race.

    3. The race weekend time is good because on the race weekend it’s fair to say, that’s the pace they had. Where as at testing, well, they will be doing lots of weird things. Consider it a benchmark.

    4. Usually test times in the winter are faster than actual gp weekends for whatever reason. Also based on forums weather true or not Pirelli put the tyre pressures up i think for this year or it could be just for the test.

      1. @arahman93 Usually test times in the winter are faster than actual gp weekends for whatever reason.

        why even mention something if you don’t know why?

      2. Pressure must be set higher with cold weather, if that can help you

        1. digitalrurouni
          2nd March 2016, 3:26

          auto und motorsport if I got the spelling correct was reporting Pirelli has mandated teams run higher psi this year than last year and that would account for slower times this year than last year I think.

      3. @arahman93 It’s the tyres. They used super-softs in testing, mediums in races. Pretty self-explanatory if you ask me.

        1. @mashiat, the thing is, even when you make a comparison between the same compounds, times are almost always faster in pre-season testing than they are during the races. It is also not specific to Pirelli either, as the same trend has been observed in the past.

          As one notable example, back on the first day of testing at Barcelona in 2009, Heidfeld set a best lap time of 1m20.338s, three tenths better than the best lap time he set in qualifying for the Spanish GP. Similarly, on the third day of testing in 2009, Button set a best time of 1m19.127s – that was a time that was over 0.8s faster than the fastest lap in qualifying (Barrichello set a 1m19.954s lap in Q2 in 2009).

          Now, part of it is down to the fact that, with the teams doing a far greater number of laps in testing than they would normally do in the race, the track conditions improve far more rapidly than in the race itself. The lower ambient temperatures also help with the efficiency of the cooling systems and yield a slight increase in power, but are not so low as to prevent the teams from being able to get the tyres into the correct working temperature range.

  3. ColdFly F1 (@)
    1st March 2016, 17:55

    @keithcollantine, how does the comparison to last year work?
    Mercedes/Rosberg had a 1’22.792 last year on day 10 (fastest I believe), and 1’23.022 this year. Yet the graph shows them as -2.648! What am I missing.

    1. @coldfly Apologies there was an error with how the chart was displaying – it’s been corrected now. Thanks for pointing it out.

  4. Well, I think it’s fair to say we all expect Mercedes to be the team to beat. Let’s hope that Ferrari have something up their sleeve to do it.

    1. It seems to be a comparison with last week test, and not 2015. I don´t remember McLaren doing 1`25 last year, they were doing 28s and 29s.

      Good improvement by the way, but stil 1,5s to recover…

      1. spafrancorchamps
        1st March 2016, 19:00

        McLaren’s best time last year was Magnussen’s 1:25.2. So I don’t believe 1:24.7 is all McLaren has got up its sleeves now as they developed a lot during last season.

    2. What about Williams? Hoping they take it up to ferrari. Mercedes, well, on a whole other level

  5. Rari going to be very close to Merc, and RB12 very gentle on tires.

  6. Soo, they are about equal?

    So if really Seb was on 50kg fuel and ultra softs and low engine mode…

    But better engine mode, less fuel, does not quite make up 2 seconds laptime…

    Equally there is no sure way on a demanding abrasive track that Mercedes would get 2s.faster on ultra soft.

    But from far ahead it looks like Ferrari is firmly behind Mercedes.

    1. @jureo
      Bottas improved by 0.5 seconds from the soft to the ultra soft, there is only a moderate difference between the US, SS and S around this circuit.

      Raikkonen’s 1’24.8 on mediums was actually very impressive too, considering that he set that time in an 8 lap stint.

      1. Ultra soft probably sees massive degradation on an all out lap. Thank you for pointing that out.

        Maybe that is why Mercedes wont run ultra soft? Since its unrepresentative?

  7. Any information on the top speeds on the pit straight? Curious to know where the McLaren was making time

    1. sunny stivala
      1st March 2016, 20:31

      Mercedes had the highest top speed on the pit straight (339.6km/h) sector one (275.5km/h) sector two (270.6km/h).
      FERRARI pit straight top speed (331.2km/h) sector one (283.2km/h) sector two (275.5km/h). these speeds were during the first four days,

  8. Charlie Whiting & representatives from every team had a meeting today to discuss the new qualifying format.

    Hearing that something that kept been brought up was simply abandoning the change altogether & sticking with the existing format, A view that Charlie will take to the WMSC.

    1. Good. If knockout qualifying is the answer, what was the question?

      If they want slow cars in front of faster ones, they should stop backmarkers getting laps back behind the safety car (and lose that whole tedious process which always seems to take forever). Could be less of a problem this year with the Manors more competitive. One of them, anyway… and on current form the Mercs will be lapping everyone else!

      1. ColdFly F1 (@)
        2nd March 2016, 6:34

        “and on current form the Mercs will be lapping everyone else!”
        made me think, @bullfrog!

        If the Mercedeses lapped every car* before a SC then all cars would be asked to ‘unlap’ themselves; that could take the rest of the GP.

        * maybe the 2nd Merc lapped all bar 1; otherwise unlapping would not resolve anything.

    2. sunny stivala
      1st March 2016, 20:22

      Barnie and his comrades in arms and those that promptly danced to his tunes were all putting the cart before the horse on the new qualifying format he as commercial rights holder was pushing onto F1, as also they were and are still doing to his push for new 2017 rules.

    3. Ha @gt-racer, Bernie has finally worked out that the knockout format would be GREAT for Mercedes :)

    4. @GT Racer I know this question is off-topic, but I’d like to ask you about the subject of Malaysian GP date as you once wrote the following on this website:
      ”I’m surprised they have Sepang so late in the year as the reason it was moved to the start of the season for 2001 was because in the later slot in had in 1999/2000 the heat/humidity was pretty much unbearable.
      While it’s still hot/humid in March/April it’s significantly more bearable than it was in 99/00.
      If the heat is the same as it was in the later season slot in 99/00 I’d expect to see the race moved back to the cooler temperatures of March/April for 2017 because you won’t find anyone who attended those two races who really enjoyed the conditions.”
      – No offence, but I was just wondering that how the October slot could be more unbearable while March is actually a slightly hotter month in the Malaysia/Singapore region than October?
      http://www.accuweather.com/en/my/sepang-international-circuit/100049_poi/month/100049_poi?monyr=3/01/2015
      http://www.accuweather.com/en/my/sepang-international-circuit/100049_poi/month/100049_poi?monyr=10/01/2015

  9. Guybrush Threepwood
    1st March 2016, 20:31

    The graph would be a lot more relevant if it was limited to the medium tyre only. There really is no point in comparing a time last year set on the medium tyre vs this year set on the ultra soft tyres, for example. You are not comparing like for like. Or is this the case and I’ve missed it?

    1. I don’t believe there is sufficient data to make that comparison possible at present. I’ve seen a few sources claiming to know the fastest time by each driver on each given tyre type but these appear to have been arrived at by looking at the headline times for each driver on each day. This could lead to gaps in the data.

      1. Data is indeed somewhat incomplete.

        https://f1metrics.wordpress.com/

        Has best analysis so far of long runs…

  10. The Mercedes performance is too large…

  11. This begs a question, if “Lewis Hamilton did not take an opportunity to set a flying lap and ended up sixth”; does it mean that Rosberg is still carrying the end-of-the-year, which would be a breath of fresh air for a championship that seems dead-set for a Mercedes driver.

    1. yes, that’s exactly what it means.

    2. “end-of-the-year momentum”, I meant to say.

    3. @faulty, I wouldn’t read very much into that, because all it means is that Hamilton’s programme for the afternoon did not include setting a representative fast time on the soft tyre.
      It is probably the case that Mercedes’s schedule means that the drivers will set fast laps on alternate days instead, with the other driver focussing on longer stints and set up work instead – that was the pattern during the first test.

  12. How much should we read into this ??

    1. @square-route How much would you like to read into this?

      That much at least, if you so wish.

  13. I’d be interested to know why Mercedes is not spending (at the moment anyway) any time testing with the other tyre compounds. Surely there’s valuable data to be gained regarding degradation, performance etc. or are they just “that confident”?

    I supposed their performance is so good they need hardly bother (and they don’t seem to be) but if they get to some tracks and suddenly find that they have “Singapore” type performance issues they will have no one to blame but themselves.

    1. I’m sure they know exactly what they’re doing and certainly have no unreliability issues of note to prevent them from seeing their whole program through by the time testing has ended. I doubt they are taking anything for granted right now and are simply working through their program.

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