Vettel finishes Day 1 on top

Sebastian Vettel happy so far

Sebastian Vettel's morning time in the SF-90 Ferrari was enough to beat McLaren driver Carlos Sainz Jr on the opening day of preseason testing in Barcelona.

While Vettel could not better his time through the afternoon as he focused on long runs, the German remained P1, finishing with 169 laps on the board.

Vettel set a 1m18.161s in the morning session on the C3 tires – the middle compound in Pirelli's testing range to Sainz’s 1m18.558s – only 0.397s slower than Vettel but his time was set on softer rubber.

Romain Grosjean Haas but his car had ground to a halt entering the final chicane with fuel pressure issues earlier in the day.

Max Verstappen put in 128 laps and set the fourth-fastest time.

Kimi Raikkonen kept Alfa Romeo in the top five, having set the fourth fastest time earlier on in the day.

Sebastian Vettel has lauded his Ferrari Formula 1 team for an "unbelievable" first day of pre-season testing that he said was "very close to perfection".

Asked by Autosport if he could have hoped for a first day like that, the four-time world champion replied: "Honestly no.

"It was unbelievable, I think the car was working really well.

"We had no issues slowing us down, we actually completed the program just the way we wanted.

"We were able to squeeze a little bit more out even."

"Obviously it's very early, the first day, and it's meaningless in a couple of weeks," he admitted.

"But for now I think huge compliments to everyone back at the factory.

"How they tackled the new rules and regulations and what they put on track today is very close to perfection in the first day of driving: the amount of laps we did, how the team was handling the car.

"Everything is more on the edge compared to last year's car, tighter and so on, what you would imagine. [But] no major dramas, so from that point of view the team is very well prepared."

Max Verstappen: “To do 128 laps on the first day of testing is a really good day, so I’m very happy with that. We collected a lot of data, which is really important, and we’ll analyse everything tonight to see what we can improve on tomorrow when Pierre is in the car. I’ll also go into detail tonight and tomorrow to see where I can improve for my second day. So far, so good and I’m happy that we were able to do so many laps. I’m looking forward to the rest of the week."

Sergio Perez: “It was a typical first day of testing, with a lot of checks and not a lot of running. It was effectively our shakedown and, even though the day was a bit shorter than expected, I felt quite happy with the car straight away. The mileage wasn’t great but I think it was still a promising start. I am happy with the performance we managed to get out of the car and with its balance. The conditions weren’t great: the track was quite cold and green to begin with, but I end the first day feeling positive. It was important to start understanding the car as much as we could and for me to make myself comfortable with it as a driver."

Daniil Kvyat: “It was a productive day today and it’s good to be back behind the wheel. We managed to do quite a few laps, which is important on the first day of testing to get some mileage under your belt so you can see how the car behaves. It’s too early to draw conclusions, but I think we have a good baseline for now and we need to keep working on that. Every time we were on track it was smooth running, and everyone was operating at a high level. I have another three days in the car which gives us the chance to improve on the things we worked on today, so we will look over the data to see which direction we will take on Wednesday. I worked with my new engineers and we all understood each other well straight away. It was certainly a good start."

Lewis Hamilton sandbagging so far

Valtteri Bottas: I quite enjoyed this morning, it's good to be back at the track. I did 69 laps and there were no major issues with the car, so it was a relatively successful run. Since the car is brand new, we immediately found ways to improve the balance and the behaviour and we will continue to work on that in the next days. It's good to see the car running well and it proves that the entire team is doing a great job, both in Brackley and Brixworth, but also here at the track. I'm looking forward to a more time in the car tomorrow afternoon.

Lewis Hamilton: It's good to be back in the car and it's great to see the car is running as smoothly at it is. It feels quite a bit different compared to last year and we're now getting to know it, trying to understand the balance and trying to understand the characteristics we're working with. It's been a positive first day, we got through our running plan and there's lots for us to learn about the new car which we will be working on.

James Allison: The first day with a new car is always a really exciting thing and today was not a bad start. Both drivers had their first taste of the W10 and got 150 trouble-free laps on the board by the end of the day. We managed to squeeze quite a lot in to this first day of running, finding out both how the 2019 tyres are working and also learning about the way the car responds to set-up changes. Today was not about absolute pace and we're reasonably pleased with the handling of the car and the way it is behaving.

Final Monday Times

C1 = hardest tires
C5 = softest tires