le clerc sent out to set a fast time. sort of close to red bull bit not really. had to be low fuel as he was in and out. politics at ferrari as usual. one a brighter note the red bull.polotics are wilfully in force again. perez made to sit and wait with a "brake issue" that of course never happened yesterday at all.
Hamiltons merc looks absolutely terrible. unless it's a drift car of course. in which case it looks freaking awesome
RED FLAG Le clera has dislodged a drain cover (unforgivable) and Hamilton hit it and moved it and le clerc hit it again. Wheres the stewards. thats two cars damaged
: The drain covers are now being checked across the whole circuit. This may be a good time to put the kettle on. Shades of Las Vegas
No Verstappen this afternoon. Shockingly red bull giving their most hated driver a break. I presume this means Verstappen gets all of tomorrow?
I used to really enjoy the testing in Barcelona.,and wish it could be still there and not in the desert at this crappy boring track.
Just watching Ricciardo go round- it’s a very smooth car- has it inherited last suspension from Red Bull?
Sainz on C4 tyres 1:30.686s Sainz running well today In other news perez went on a full race run and has limped into the pits. Norris has done 1:31.256 on mediums Le Clerc did 1:31.750 on mediums. Perez so far hasn't gone very quick at all.
Perez straight back out. Whatever the issues was seems to have been quickly resolved. Possibly a warning to be checked or some such safe mode entered.
Perez has finally surfaced with 1:31.773 on mediums. Ferrari doing the political stunt of triyng to get a headline or is this a real good day. It didn't look very good this morning at all for le clerc.
This from the BBC: "Carlos Sainz now sits comfortably atop the times after two runs on the C4 tyre. He said before starting his running this after that it was no surprise Ferrari can do some quick lap times - pointedly mentioning the fact that the team took more pole positions than Red Bull in the second half of 2023. But he says their focus is on two specific areas. One is tyre usage and being able to maintain a stronger race pace over a long stint rather than suffering from an earlier drop-off in performance than Red Bull. The other? The car's sensitivity to wind. Charles Leclerc has said the car feels a lot better than last year's." So I don't think there's a lot to gain from them them getting the fastest time as a headline grabber, they are trying to improve in other areas. I think Leclerc said something ealier about the car having much better driveability which would enable them to take the fight forward in races rather than one lap pace.
I did think their running of the C4 was more about their tyre wear problem from last season than dick measuring.
