By Adam Tate, Managing Editor
The second day of running in Barcelona once again saw Sebastian Vettel top the session for Ferrari. The four time champ lowered his best time from yesterday by two seconds after slapping on a set of Pirelli’s new ultra-soft compounds. Daniel Ricciardo had the second best time for Red Bull, also on the ultra-softs, but near 3/4th’s of a second behind the Ferrari. Sergio Perez validated Force India’s performance by putting in the third best lap of the day on the super-softs.
Nico Rosberg took over for Lewis Hamilton today and pulled 172 laps out of the W07 chassis. Clearly not bothered by chasing speed just yet, the Mercedes set the fourth best time. On the medium tires.
All runners increased their mileage and dropped their times as they further evaluated the performance of the new cars. In particular, Haas F1 had a strong day with Esteban Gutierrez at the wheel. Gutierrez completed 79 laps in the car without a failure and had the sixth best time of the day.
The day had three red flags; one for Jolyon Palmer when his Renault Power Unit stopped him on track, one for a gearbox issue in Max Verstappen’s Toro Rosso and the final of the day came with only minutes left in the session when Vettel’s Ferrari pulled up short.
| Driver | Team | Time | Laps |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sebastian Vettel | Ferrari | 1:22.810 | 126 |
| Daniel Ricciardo | Red Bull | 1:23.525 | 112 |
| Sergio Perez | Force India | 1:23.650 | 101 |
| Nico Rosberg | Mercedes | 1:24.867 | 172 |
| Marcus Ericsson | Sauber | 1:25.237 | 108 |
| Esteban Gutierrez | Haas | 1:25.524 | 79 |
| Valtteri Bottas | Williams | 1:25.648 | 134 |
| Pascal Wehrlein | Manor | 1:25.925 | 71 |
| Fernando Alonso | McLaren | 1:26.082 | 119 |
| Jolyon Palmer | Renault | 1:26.189 | 42 |
| Max Verstappen | Toro Rosso | 1:26.539 | 121 |
Image: Haas F1 Team
