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Ferrari matches lap record

It would be fair to say that eyebrows were raised at Sakhir this morning as Felipe Massa, on a qualifying simulation run in the Ferrari F2007, set a lap time of 1:29.989. This is within a fraction of his own fastest testing time from 2006 (1:29.958) and shatters the expectation that the rev-limited cars running now, with their Bridgestone ‘control’ tyres, would be over two seconds slower than those raced last season.

The next fastest times, both half a second behind Massa, come from the Renault pair of Heikki Kovalainen and Giancarlo Fisichella, with the second Ferrari of Kimi Raikkonen a fraction behind them.

Fernando Alonso returned to the track after a break today, giving the McLaren MP4-22 a last day of testing prior to the trip to Australia, and has so far set a time that shades Raikkonen by mere thousandths of a second.

That the next car, sixth fastest Rubens Barrichello in the Honda RA107, is currently half a second slower than the four ahead displays the difference between the front three teams at present and the rest of the pack.

Raising eyebrows even further is Scott Speed, the young American placing the Toro Rosso STR2, with its Ferrari engine, in seventh fastest so far this morning, ahead of the two ‘sister’ cars, the Renault-powered Red Bull RB3’s driven by David Coulthard and Mark Webber. Speeds time, notably, was a further half a second slower than Barrichello.

Rounding out the top ten is Robert Kubica, he and team-mate Nick Heidfeld not showing the BMW F1.07’s usual blistering speed this morning as the team concentrate on the frequent hydraulic failures that threaten to get in the way of early season results, while Ralf Schumacher and Franck Montagny are hard at work for Toyota, and still well down the time sheets so far today.

It is probable that the time set by Massa will not be beaten as the temperature rises throughout the day here in Bahrain, but UpdateF1 will bring you a round up of the final day of testing later in the day.

Written: Thu, 01 Mar 2007 10:14:17