For most teams, pre season testing is over, so we can compare some of the race simulations done in this test. The average race sim lap times are: Alonso 1:29.409* Vettel 1:29.685 Massa 1:30.513 Webber 1:30.542 Heidfeld 1:30.638 Schumacher 1:31.082 Maldonado 1:31.380 Rosberg 1:31.719 Alonso did two odd laps of 1:50. Removing them and Alonso's average lap time would be 1:28.502. While everyone pitted three times, Alonso was the only person to pit four times.
without knowing how much fuel they all started with its difficult to compare. But from a rough guide it seems fairly even, but without fuel levels....
Well they are doing race simulations, so fuel levels will be similar and therefore should be compared.
Similar, but not the same, could be +/- 10laps off each other (which is easily a second+ a lap), we simply do not know
Tyre compounds as well. They might have wanted to see how the softer compounds last in case they were considering qualifying on the hards. Are those average times not including in and out laps? If they aren't that would skew Alonso's times favourably because he'd have been able to push harder having done four stops, it also makes the four stop strategy look faster than the three.
please log in to view this image Massa got owned by Alonso - but then Alonso had more favorable track conditions when he did his sim
Bit strange that Massa's initial speed in his 3rd stint was no faster than in the 2nd stint. Slow times in Alonso's 4th stint could be safety car sim?
It's likely that Massa pitted onto an older set of tyres - if you think about it, he used four sets of tyres for his race simulation, and there are only 6 sets of tyres available for qualifying and the race. I also think Alonso was simulating a safety car.