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Valtteri Bottas ended the second day of Formula 1 pre-season testing fastest for Mercedes in Bahrain, with a laptime of 1m30.289s.
Bottas did not run in the first hour of the session, as much has been made of Mercedes’ shaky start to F1 testing, but ultimately completed a total of 56 laps.
He set his fastest time of the day on the softest C5 compound tyre with 27 minutes of the afternoon session to go as most of the field switched their focus to completing qualifying simulations.
AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly set the second-fastest time of the day, 0.124s behind Bottas and leading Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll – who made a late bid for the third-fastest time to recover a slightly disappointing day for Aston Martin after Sebastian Vettel’s limited early running.
McLaren’s Lando Norris had been fastest for most of the afternoon – taking over the mantle from his team-mate Daniel Ricciardo who had set the pace earlier in the day – and finished the day with the fourth-fastest time, while Ricciardo’s time meant he stayed within the top 10 all day and ended proceedings with the ninth-fastest time.
Antonio Giovinazzi was the first driver to pass the 100 lap mark, completing a total of 125 laps and finishing the day in fifth place for Alfa Romeo.
Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc spent the afternoon mainly focusing on long runs but took part in qualifying simulations in the last hour to set the sixth- fastest time overall. His new team-mate Carlos Sainz Jr was 13th.
Nicholas Latifi was seventh for Williams, followed by Red Bull’s Sergio Perez who caused the only red flag of the afternoon when his engine cover was loosened by the turbulent air of running immediately behind Latifi on track and became detached.
Fernando Alonso officially made his F1 return for Alpine after a two-year hiatus, completing the most laps of total running with 128. He ended the day 10th in the timings.
Reigning world champion Lewis Hamilton managed 58 laps of running in the morning session and was classified in 15th place.
Vettel returned to the track for Aston Martin this morning after an impressive first run yesterday, but was confined to the garage for most of his session due to a gearbox-related issue and managed only 10 laps in total. He will return to the car for one last outing tomorrow afternoon.
Saturday times
1 Bottas (Mercedes) 1m30.289s
2 Gasly (AlphaTauri) 1m30.413s
3 Stroll (Aston Martin) 1m30.460s
4 Norris (McLaren) 1m30.586s
5 Giovinazzi (Alfa Romeo) 1m30.760s
6 Leclerc (Ferrari) 1m30.886s
7 Latifi (Williams) 1m31.672s
8 Perez (Red Bull) 1m31.682s
9 Ricciardo (McLaren) 1m32.215s
10 Alonso (Alpine) 1m32.339s
11 Tsunoda (AlphaTauri) 1m32.684s
12 Schumacher (Haas) 1m32.883s
13 Sainz (Ferrari) 1m33.072s
14 Mazepin (Haas) 1m33.101s
15 Hamilton (Mercedes) 1m33.399s
16 Vettel (Aston Martin) 1m38.849s
