Kimi Raikkonen in the lead at the midpoint of the final test day at Barcelona

Published on 09 March 2018 by Raymond Snip

On the fourth, and last, test day of the second winter test in Barcelona, it was Kimi Raikkonen who set the fastest time in his Ferrari mid-way through Friday. The Fin set a time of 1:17.221 and was almost one and a half seconds faster than runner up Romain Grosjean in the Haas F1. Under a bright sun and spring-like temperatures of 19 degrees, the teams are working towards the beginning of the new season that will start in Melbourne Australia in about two weeks. After Max Verstappen completed his test program on Thursday, on Friday it was his teammate Daniel Ricciardo’s turn to fire up his RB14 for Aston Martin Red Bull Racing. Halfway through the day the Aussie was sitting in P7.

During the final test day, which, just like on Wednesday, will not be interrupted by a lunch break, there were two red flag incidents in the morning. The first red flag is caused by Fernando Alonso, who has to stop his McLaren with a leak in turn seven. It is reported that the leak is due to an issue with the gearbox. Charles Leclerc causes the second red flag interruption. In turn 12 the Frenchman spins in his Sauber and hits the tire barrier. It takes a while until the track is cleared. The Sauber is towed and the tire barrier has to be repaired.

While most teams are on the softer compounds, Red Bull Racing continues on the medium tires. It makes little to no sense to install the hyper soft tires onto the car here in Barcelona, since those will only be used for the first time during the Monaco Grand Prix. The Renault and McLaren teams do make a few laps, but neither one will set a time due to gearbox problems.

Time-chart test day 4 Barcelona (13:00 hrs):

    Driver              Team               	Time         	Difference    Laps
1   Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari		        1:17.221		      66	
2   Romain Grosjean	Haas F1		        1:18.590	+1.369	      76	
3   Brendon Hartley	Toro Rosso		1:18.949	+1.728	      91	
4   Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes		1:19.464	+2.243        97	
5   Esteban Ocon	Force India		1:19.667	+2.446	      61	
6   Sergey Sirotkin	Williams		1:20.250	+3.029	      72	
7   Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull Racing		1:20.275	+3.054	      47	
8   Charles Leclerc	Sauber		        1:20.878	+3.657	      18	
9   Fernando Alonso	McLaren		        geen tijd		      7	
10  Carlos Sainz	Renault		        geen tijd		      4