Sandbagging Mercedes begins to put the hammer down (Update)

UPDATE Added driver quotes below.

02/27/15

Rosberg turns the heat up on Friday. 2015 will be the 2nd consecutive year of a Mercedes 1-2 at every event. Yawn…..

Everyone in the paddock knows that the Mercedes team is about 2 seconds per lap faster than the competition, but until today, they have been running harder tires and carrying more fuel to conceal their advantage.

On Friday they began to show just how fast they can be. Nico Rosberg set the fastest lap of Barcelona Formula 1 testing so far running on soft tires for the first time. Rosberg turned a lap at 1m22.792s and that was not even on super soft tires.

That lap was 0.7s quicker than the previous best, set by another Mercedes powered car – the Williams' of Felipe Massa on the same tire on Thursday, and 1.2s clear of Valtteri Bottas in the Williams who was his nearest challenger today.

Nico Rosberg
Today was a difficult day to start with but ended on a positive. During the early runs, even though the numbers looked like they were in the right place with the setup, it was actually very far away from where it needed to be, which was unusual and caught us off guard a little bit. We didn't really understand why, so a big part of the day has been chasing the setup and finding the right direction. It was really difficult to understand where to go. I had a lot of oversteer in the car, so the rear was just all over the place with no traction. But eventually, towards the end especially, it was feeling more and more decent. Then, putting the soft tires on, that gives you the grip anyway so it doesn't really matter what the balance is – more or less it will be possible to do a good lap. I'm pleased with my two laps at the end – I nailed them pretty well and they were both identical, so a good ending to the day. We're confident that we have a good car and I'm starting to feel good in it. At the same time, of course, we're well aware that the others have been posting some quick times and we can take nothing for granted. We have a great team who are doing a fantastic job and always want better and better, so we will keep our heads down and keep working. It's a work in progress…

Pastor Maldonado:
We ran the car for a long time today which has been a good endorsement of my winter training program as I still feel fresh after 140 laps! We did a lot of different assessments so I had plenty to think about and it was good to do the race simulation as we’ll soon be heading to Melbourne. There’s a lot of information to digest from today and I can’t wait to get back in the car on Sunday.

Friday Results