Barcelona Day 4: Bottas on top as F1 testing comes to end (Update)

UPDATE We transposed some of today's test time numbers. The corrected table is shown below.

03/01/15

Valtteri Bottas

Valtteri Bottas used super-soft tires in the morning and his Williams ended the final session of pre-season testing on top.

The Finn's qualifying simulation run before lunch was 1m23.063s, 0.4 seconds clear of Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel, who also was on super-soft tires.

After qualifying runs in the morning, the teams switched to longer race simulation stints after lunch.

Sauber's Felipe Nasr was third quickest, also using Ferrari power.

McLaren's problems continued. Jenson Button missed most of the morning because of a sensor issue that required the team to remove the Honda power unit. He put 30 laps in and the team is obvious scrambling. Fernando Alonso would have been better off taking gardening leave this year as originally rumored.

Valtteri Bottas: It was a really good day and a great way to finish the test. One of the main points we have learnt is that the FW37 is very reliable. The car we are taking to Melbourne is very competitive and should make for an interesting start to the season. We have made the most out of our time testing and I need to say a really big thanks to the team, not only trackside but also everyone back at the factory as they have produced a really quick and reliable car.

Sebastian Vettel
The positive thing is that, once again, we have done a lot of kilometers and gathered useful information. The fact that our race simulation went more or less as planned is encouraging from a reliability point of view, although this is an aspect where we can still improve. From a performance point of view, it’s clear that Mercedes is still ahead by quite a way, but right behind there is us, Williams and Red Bull, all very close. We will know more in a couple of weeks. Meanwhile we must move forward one step at a time, looking above all at what we are doing ourselves.

Felipe Nasr:
It was another very good day. I am very happy that we did not have any issues on the car. I ran 159 laps, which is quite pleasing for the team and also for myself. The car is reliable, so we were able to collect a lot of data. Today we went through many procedures to be well-prepared for the first race weekend in Melbourne, including short runs, race simulation, practice starts and pitstops. Now I cannot wait for Melbourne.

Nico Rosberg
Today was a good day and, overall, that was a very interesting test here in Barcelona. We made some mechanical set up changes on the car which was very interesting to me. I also did a long run at the end today on the soft tires which was okay. In Melbourne we will have the soft tire and it will be a challenge to manage them well, so we need to look at that. After this test, though, we can be happy. The team did a fantastic job. Thanks to everybody, who was involved in the development of the car. We are very optimistic. Now, I look forward to flying to Australia and getting back to racing.

Max Verstappen
Today, we didn’t do as many laps as we wanted, but overall, I have had a very good winter test season, completing a lot of laps. Today, the team did a very good job to get me back out on track. I learned a lot about the car, in terms of set-up and I could see in which areas I can improve. In two weeks’ time, we will be racing in Melbourne. I can’t wait and I believe we have a good package. Together with the team I have learned a lot over these three tests and I feel ready to go racing.

Pastor Maldonado:
It was a shame to end the day early, but that was the only issue we’ve had like this during testing so we can look to the positive that we have a lot of information to take the car in the right direction. My braking was compromised coming into turn four, meaning I went off the track and hit the barriers. I was able to brake and slow, just not as much as the maximum otherwise possible. The car was not too badly damaged and I am fine, but it’s a shame we had this issue as we would have been looking at running the softer tires in the afternoon and putting in some fast laps. I’m looking forward to getting back in the car in Melbourne as I think we have good potential this season.

Sunday Results

*Sandbagging