By Alan Baldwin
SAKHIR, Bahrain (Reuters) – Seven times world champion Lewis Hamilton was fastest for Ferrari on the second morning of pre-season Formula One testing in Bahrain on Thursday.
The Briton, who left Mercedes at the end of last season, put in a best lap of one minute 29.379 seconds and did 45 laps in a session interrupted by light drizzle at the desert Sakhir circuit.
He was watched by Ferrari chairman John Elkann, who paid a flying visit to a team who were runners-up last season and will start the new campaign with real hopes of going one better and winning a championship for the first time since 2008.
George Russell, now the lead driver at Mercedes since Hamilton’s departure, did 71 laps and was 0.399 slower with Carlos Sainz, the Spaniard Hamilton replaced at Ferrari, third for Williams.
Pierre Gasly put Renault-owned Alpine fourth on the timesheets with Fernando Alonso fifth for Aston Martin and Yuki Tsunoda sixth for Racing Bulls.
Oscar Piastri was seventh for champions McLaren after making contact with the dawdling Sauber of Nico Hulkenberg in a rare testing collision.
With lap time still not the main focus, McLaren were sounding satisfied with their car’s performance.
“We have good innovation on the car. We have not stood still in the winter and I am excited to see it all work. So far so good but it’s obviously early days,” team boss Zak Brown told Sky Sports television.
“We have tried to enhance what we had but there is some stuff on there I don’t think has been totally noticed yet, which I think will happen in due course.”
Red Bull’s Liam Lawson, Hulkenberg and Haas’s Esteban Ocon, who was focusing on long runs and did 69 laps, completed the morning lineup with each team running one car only.
Sainz and Lawson were doing a full day while the rest were due to hand over at the lunchtime break to teammates for the second four-hour session.
The season starts in Australia on March 16.
(Reporting by Alan Baldwin; Editing by Ken Ferris)
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