Haas ended the final day of Formula 1’s 2021 post-season Abu Dhabi test on top with Ferrari junior Robert Shwartzman at the wheel.
Shwartzman, who finished runner-up to Alpine junior Oscar Piastri in Formula 2 this year, was the only driver to use a 2021 car and tyres on the second and final day of the test.
The other nine drivers in the test were all using mule cars with 2022 specification tyres.
Teams were given the choice of running a young driver in a 2021 car on either of the two days, Haas was the only team to choose Wednesday.
Shwartzman topped the session on a 1m25.348s, over two seconds slower than Mercedes Formula E champion Nyck de Vries’ session-topping time from Tuesday.
But he was half a second clear of the fastest mule car – Lando Norris’s McLaren.
Sebastian Vettel’s Aston Martin caused a red flag early on due to a hydraulic failure but recovered to go third quickest.
George Russell, who completed both days of running in Mercedes’ mule car, with Lewis Hamilton absent from the test and Valtteri Bottas making his Alfa Romeo debut on Tuesday, was fourth quickest ahead of AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly who rounded out the top five.
Carlos Sainz was sixth quickest for Ferrari ahead of his compatriot Fernando Alonso.
The only rookie in the 2022 F1 field, Guanyu Zhou, was eighth fastest for his new Alfa Romeo team. He ran in its mule car, having driven its 2021 car on Tuesday.
Red Bull’s Sergio Perez was ninth-fastest for Red Bull and over two and a half seconds slower than Shwartzman’s best effort.
One-time F1 starter Pietro Fittipaldi was 10th and slowest in Haas’ mule car.
Williams were absent from the day’s running as the team doesn’t have a mule car to run. It was able to use its 2021 car for its junior driver Logan Sargeant on Tuesday.
How the 2022 tyre testing went
Edd Straw
After drivers reported understeer on day one of the test, Pirelli dropped the front pressures from 21.5psi to 20psi to combat this today, which helped with grip and reduced the graining. The rear tyres remained unchanged at 17.5psi
But the tyres are not expected to have a fundamental understeer balance next year with teams believing this was down to the set-up limitations of the mule cars in testing.
Drivers reported a positive impression of the straightline traction, although did feel the effect of the increase in wheel rim weight resulting from the increase from 13 to 18 inches. The front rims are 2.5kg heavier than the ’21 rims and the rears are 3kg.
These are the final tyre specification for next year, with the tyres for pre-season testing and the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix currently in production.
