F1 Preseason: Norris and McLaren top Day 1 of testing in Bahrain

In the afternoon/night session, Lando Norris turned a lap of 1:30.430s in his 2025 McLaren F1 car to top the first day of preseason F1 testing at the Bahrain International Circuit.

—by Mark Cipolloni–

The McLaren was the fastest car in 2024, and they have come out of the box in 2025 maintaining their advantage.

George Russell was 2nd fastest in the Mercedes W16, 0.157s behind Norris.

Max Verstappen was third quick in the Red Bull Honda RB21, 0.244s behind Norris.

Charles Leclerc was 4th for the #16 Ferrari, 0.448s behind Norris while his former teammate, Carlos Sainz Jr., rounded out the top-5 for Williams, 0.525s behind Norris.

The session was delayed 1-hour in the middle of the afternoon session when the entire circuit lost power.

Track Statement: At approximately 5pm today, a power outage caused by an external substation failure led to the afternoon session on track to be paused. Power has since been restored and the afternoon session has resumed. We appreciate everyone’s patience.

One day down, two to go. No crashes, a couple of spins and plenty of laps completed.

All the teams will be happy with how their test has begun, but as to how competitive everyone is… Bar the close field, it is hard to say yet who is definitely on top of the pile, such are the unknowns at the moment.

2025 F1 Day 1 of Preseason Testing Results