F1 test, day 2: Sainz and Alonso are still on top and Mercedes are struggling

Carlos Sainz marked the best record so far in the preseason test of Formula 1 2023who helped him lead the morning session of the second day of rehearsals Bahrain on the wheel of a Ferrari SF23 which still runs smoothly and allows the team to do some very robust testing. Whether or not he is there to fight him red bull, that is still unknown. What is striking is the great difference between the program carried out by the Italians and those Milton Keynes on a day where alonso he came back, third to him Aston Martin.

The man from Madrid gave the total 70 laps with the Ferrariall of them with medium tires, during which he did some short stints of 5 or 6 laps to eventually perform two stints of 14 laps and a final of 12. In this way, the man took advantage from Madrid the greater stability of track conditions that exist.in the morning at Bahrain to analyze his car with the same compound, try different settings and be able to understand it better come to the beginning of the course fully combined here to fight everyone from race 1. This afternoon, he will ride instead leclerc.

For his part, red bull he chose a different approach. On the first day the team scared us with 157 laps of Verstappen and the best time, achieved all this with great calmness and no ruffled hair. The next morning, it was the turn for ‘Czech’ Perez He will make his debut at these tests before handing the wheel of the RB19 back to Verstappen this afternoon. already perez He had to do some background work, without looking at the times and running the first race simulation of his car: 15 and 18 laps in two stints with medium tires and a final 24 laps with hard rubber. He also conducted a clear race simulation AlphaTauri with Tsunoda.

It seems that Red Bull is one step ahead, working calmly, with a sense of having more certainty and homework than others.

Alonso, third in the morning and will continue this afternoon

Fernando Alonso, after his good official debut on the first day of pre-season testing in Bahrain, faced a busy day. He drove throughout the second day, in the morning session and in the afternoon, looking to help the team continue to draw conclusions about a car that behaves very similar to what the simulations indicated, something that is always a good thing. thing. news for anyone team.

Taking advantage of the slight variation in track conditions that should occur in the morning, in Friday’s morning session the Spaniard focused his work program on making constant set up changes to Aston Martin AMR23 to test the car, understanding its sensitivity to changes, its behavior, the work window in terms of settings and balance of the car. A lot of work for a Fernando who added 64 laps divided into multiple runs of 4 or 5 laps with medium rubber and a final long run of 16 laps.

Hamilton did not tame the Mercedes

the morning of Mercedes This shows that the star team still has a lot of work to do if they want to fight for a win soon. The problems at Mercedes are far from last year. His car no longer suffers from ‘porpoising’ and his boss admits it, Toto Wolffbut what the Austrian also recognized was his W14 He is behind the two leading favorites at the moment, awaiting the arrival of his scheduled first evolutions of the course.

Right now, this Friday Lewis hamilton he was seen fighting with his own car on several corners. He saved the spin with good counter-steering in turn 1 and suffered a few blows in the final corner. Mercedes He tried set-up changes to the car aimed at improving the rear end behavior of the British car, but the W14 he seems very nervous.