Hamilton on top on first day in-season test Bahrain

Published on 18 April 2017 by Mike Motilall

Lewis Hamilton was the fastest man on track after the first day of in-season testing in Bahrain. The Brit clocked a 1:31.358 in his Mercedes, putting him over six tenths up on Antonio Giovinazzi, who was second. Driving in Ferrari colours today, he replaced Wehrlein who had been injured in Australia and China. Daniel Ricciardo came in third at the end of the day.

Although there was no official lunch break scheduled, most of the teams decided to break for lunch around midday. After that, it was business as usual again on the track in Bahrain. Apart from the fact that Lance Stroll has been replaced by Felipe Massa at Williams, there are no changes to the list of drivers.

The afternoon goes by without any particular incidents for most of the teams. Sean Gelael, driving for Toro Rosso, suffers some issues on the car just after noon, forcing him to park his car alongside the track for the second time in a row. However, the issue is solved pretty quickly and the Indonesian Formula 2-driver heads out on track with still some two hours left on the clocks.

Sadly, that is not the case at McLaren. After a bad race weekend, even today the English team is struggling. Due to a water leak in the ERS-system, Oliver Turvey is only able to lap the track twice. To save some time, the team decide to change the entire power unit. However, it takes them so much time to do this, that the Brit makes it back to the track with just only forty five minutes left on the clock. At the end of the day, he has only managed to lap the track seventeen times.

Marcus Erisson is Sauber’s most productive driver and does some hundred laps on the circuit. The top five is rounded up by Romain Grosjean and Felipe Massa.

Ricciardo is not able to better his time which was set in the early session and only manages to do some forty-five laps as well. Tomorrow, Max Verstappen’s team mate will hand over the RB13 to Pierre Gasly. He will take over for the final day of in-season testing in Bahrain. Only after the Hungarian Grand Prix will there be another in-season test again. That test will be the final two days of in-season testing on the agenda.

In-Season Test - Bahrain International Circuit - Tuesday 18 April 2017

RESULTS DAY 1

Pos.	Driver	             Team	  Time	        Gap	Laps
1	Lewis Hamilton	     Mercedes	  1m31.358s	 	97
2	Antonio Giovinazzi   Ferrari	  1m31.984s	0.626s	93
3	Daniel Ricciardo     Red Bull	  1m32.349s	0.991s	45
4	Romain Grosjean	     Haas	  1m33.452s	1.094s	87
5	Felipe Massa	     Williams	  1m32.509s	1.151s	56
6	Nico Hulkenberg	     Renault	  1m33.624	2.266s	74
7	Lance Stroll	     Williams	  1m33.729s	2.371s	35
8	Sean Gelael	     Toro Rosso	  1m33.885s	2.527s	78
9	Sebastian Vettel     Ferrari	  1m33.894s	2.536s	89
10	Alfonso Celis Jr     Force India  1m33.939s	2.581s	70