• First Barcelona Test, Day Two

Vettel tops second morning from Hamilton

Chris Medland at the Circuit de Catalunya February 20, 2013
Sebastian Vettel was 0.529s clear of the rest of the field © Sutton Images
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Sebastian Vettel again set the pace during the second morning of testing at Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya.

Having set the pace at the start of the test on Tuesday morning, Vettel ensured he was top of the time sheets at lunch for the second consecutive day when he set a time of 1:22.197. Vettel set the benchmark having lowered his personal best on numerous short runs on the soft tyre.

Lewis Hamilton enjoyed a much more productive start to the day than team-mate Nico Rosberg had managed as he was second quickest. Rosberg completed only 14 laps on the opening morning due to a gearbox problem but Hamilton was able to complete 64 en route to a best time of 1:22.726. Though over half a second slower than Vettel, Hamilton did set his time on the hard compound and was seen running periscopic exhaust exits at one stage in the morning.

Hamilton's replacement at McLaren, Sergio Perez, was third fastest after clocking a 1:22.743 on the soft tyre, and that was enough to leave him over half a second clear of Fernando Alonso. Ferrari completed much fewer laps than on Tuesday with Alonso - who admitted he felt stiff after amassing 110 on his first day back in the car - only doing 28 by lunch.

Valtteri Bottas was fifth quickest as he got his first taste of the FW35 and completed 53 laps with a best time of 1:23.561 as Williams focused on analysing front wings. Daniel Ricciardo and Paul di Resta were the only other two drivers to get within two seconds of Vettel's best time.

Nico Hulkenberg ended the morning in eighth place but part of his schedule included testing Sauber's own version of the Drag Reduction Device (DRD) pioneered by Lotus and also seen on the Mercedes at Jerez.

Cold temperatures early on saw many of the teams performing short evaluation runs - or in Red Bull's case pit-stop practice - as the track conditions made meaningful testing difficult for the opening hour. Running went uninterrupted for the duration of the morning, with only Kimi Raikkonen hitting trouble as a gearbox change restricted him to only four laps and no time set.

Times

1 Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull) 1:22.197, 43 laps
2 Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes) 1:22.726, 64 laps
3 Sergio Perez (McLaren) 1:22.743, 35 laps
4 Fernando Alonso (Ferrari) 1:23.247, 28 laps
5 Valtteri Bottas (Williams) 1:23.561, 53 laps
6 Daniel Ricciardo (Toro Rosso) 1:23.718, 46 laps
7 Paul di Resta (Force India) 1:23.971, 41 laps
8 Nico Hulkenberg (Sauber) 1:24.638, 39 laps
9 Charles Pic (Caterham) 1:26.985, 52 laps
10 Max Chilton (Marussia) 1:28.900, 32 laps
11 Kimi Raikkonen (Lotus) No time, 4 laps

Chris Medland is assistant editor at ESPNF1

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Chris Medland is assistant editor at ESPNF1 Chris Medland, who in his youth even found the Pacific GPs entertaining, talked his way in to work at the British Grand Prix and was somehow retained for three years. He also worked on the BBC's F1 output prior to becoming assistant editor ahead of the 2011 season

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