Webber sets fastest lap on opening day of final testing at Barcelona

Mark Webber turned a lap of 1:22.693 toward the final minutes of the afternoon session on the 4.655km Circuit de Catalunya. The Australian placed his Infiniti Red Bull-Renault over Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton by 1.655 of a second. As it turned out the teams actually had just one hour at the end to set the fastest laps. Webber was on the soft-compound Pirelli tyres on a dry track when he turned the top laptime of the day.

He also toured the circuit for 90 laps in the RB9, and despite the heavy winds in Barcelona, Spain, Webber commented on the day: “It was pretty heavy, I must say. There was a big tailwind down to Turn One and in other sections it was pretty dusty. The level of wind wasn’t trivial but to be honest it was tricky enough anyway because of the greasy conditions on the track.”

Hamilton’s time was a 1:24.348 with a total of 113 laps. In the dry conditions, the Briton was on the Pirelli intermediate tyres, and toward the final laps was using the medium compound tyres. “The track started out really wet this morning but thankfully the conditions dried out later on and we were able to complete some proper running. It felt good to work through the race simulation this afternoon; both to get myself back in practice and to put valuable miles on the car,” he said.

Hamilton made the change to the Mercedes works team this year and he said, “All the guys have done a fantastic job both here and at the factory. I'm really happy that we're making progress together and very much enjoying working with everyone. The last couple of days of pre-season testing are always really exciting when everyone starts to add their upgrades so I'm looking forward to the weekend.”

Third today was a surprise as Jean-Eric Vergne set his best lap at 1:25.017 in the Scuderia Toro Rosso STR8. Like the other teams, Vergne spent most of the day on rain tyres and intermediates, which was good since Pirelli had made changes to their wet weather tyres for the 2013 season. Vergne and the team engineers were able to do aerodynamic work, including the evaluation of a few new components.

Vergne commented: “Not the best of days, because we had many things to test and the rain meant we were not able to get that much done, but we have to remember that the other teams have similar programmes and the rain affects everyone. The car seems to behave really well in the wet and it also felt good in the dry, during the few laps I managed at the end of the day.”

There are three more days left for the teams to complete their development work and evaluate new components and setups. The Australian Grand Prix is looming closer.

Unofficial times

Pos.	Driver	Car	Time	Laps
1	Mark Webber	Red Bull	1:22.693	90
2	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:24.348	113
3	Jean-Eric Vergne	Toro Rosso	1:25.017	59
4	Valtteri Bottas	Williams	1:26.458	85
5	Sergio Perez	McLaren	1:26.538	100
6	Esteban Gutierrez	Sauber	1:26.574	92
7	Paul Di Resta	Force India	1:27.107	57
8	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	1:27.541	112
9	Max Chilton	Marussia	1:28.166	78
10	Charles Pic	Caterham	1:28.644	83
11	Romain Grosjean	Lotus	1:34.928	52