Mercedes back on top but rivals show strength as Bahrain F1 testing concludes

Mercedes ended the first pre-season test with the fastest times of the week but Ferrari, McLaren and Red Bull all enjoyed more good mileage in Bahrain.

Kimi Antonelli had endured a tough week across the first two days of running – registering just 33 laps in total – but his time in the car on Friday afternoon was far more productive. The Italian managed 61 laps and rose to the top of the times on the C3 compound tire – used by all drivers except Carlos Sainz and Valtteri Bottas – with the fastest lap of the week, posting a 1m33.669s.

Antonelli completed more than a race distance, and enjoyed a smooth simulated race start during a slightly chaotic end of the session testing various systems. Seven cars lined up on the grid after an extra formation lap was carried out, but Franco Colapinto nearly dropped his Alpine while warming his tires and had to recover from the grass into the final grid position.

When the lights went out, only three cars – Antonelli from pole, Sergio Perez from third in the Cadillac and Isack Hadjar from fourth for Red Bull – got away, with Oscar Piastri’s McLaren sitting on the front row for a spell and Sainz, Esteban Ocon and Colapinto all taking longer to move.

Some teams are facing a challenge getting the turbo into the right window to launch from the line during their start procedures, while Colapinto then parked up at the end of the pit straight to end the day’s running.

It was George Russell who flagged how long it was taking him to get the turbo spooling to the right speed during his practice starts but he also had an encouraging day from a Mercedes perspective, ending up second on the timing screens, 0.249s behind Antonelli. The one-two mirrored the way Mercedes ended its running in Barcelona in January, with Russell adding 78 laps to his total.

Third was Lewis Hamilton who stopped on track at the very end of another strong test for Ferrari, with what could have been a fuel run-out test. Hamilton had just hit 150 laps when he caused a red flag at Turn 8, with his best time of 1m34.209s just over half a second adrift of Antonelli.

The top four teams from recent seasons were in similar positions to end the first official test, with McLaren and Red Bull rounding out the top six. Oscar Piastri completed the full day for McLaren and was the busiest driver with a mammoth 161 laps, just 10 shy of three race distances. Piastri was 0.880s off Antonelli, but a similar margin clear of the two Red Bull drivers who shared running on Friday.

Lando Norris named Red Bull as the team getting up to speed quickest during testing and also referenced McLaren being behind Ferrari, but outright lap times were not the order of the day for Max Verstappen and Hadjar. Verstappen was 1.6s off Antonelli and 0.3s ahead of his teammate, with the pair combining for 120 laps.

Technical director Pierre Wache suggested Red Bull’s rivals were taking longer to understand how to get the deployment right on each of the two tracks visited so far during pre-season, and that the gaps closed up through the three days in Bahrain.

Haas also split running between its two drivers on the final day of the test and again caught the eye with consistent mileage, completed 145 laps in total, with Ocon seventh and Ollie Bearman ninth in terms of fastest laps. Nico Hulkenberg rounded out the top 10, with Audi again showing the performance to slot into the midfield at this early point of pre-season.

That Haas total was one more lap than Alpine managed with Colapinto, and one fewer than Williams completed using both drivers on Friday. Having missed the Barcelona test, Williams is playing catch-up in terms of learning with the car but has shown strong reliability and will look to unlock more pace during next week’s final three days of pre-season running.

Another team searching for performance is Aston Martin, with Lance Stroll backing up his previous comments by posting a best time that was once again 4.5s off the outright pace. 72 laps was the lowest total of any single team on Friday, leaving Aston with just 206 laps for the week, comfortably adrift of the next lowest – Mercedes on 282 – and the Williams benchmark of 425.

Cadillac rounded off a solid first test despite Bottas stopping on track during the morning session, with the new American team exceeding 100 laps in total on all three days, and Sergio Perez posting a best time some 0.5s off what his teammate managed on day two.