It seems that all it took for Lotus was a simple switch from Renault to Mercedes power units in order for their fortunes to turn around completely.
If you recall, the 2014 F1 season started disastrously for Lotus, where they just couldn’t stay on the track, not to mention score some points. Then came the switch over to Mercedes engines and now their pace is looking amazing.
On Saturday, Pastor Maldonado was yet again the pace-setter (just like on Day 1), lapping the Catalan circuit in 1:24.348s on supersofts and finishing just under four tenth of a second clear of Toro Rosso’s Max Verstappen.
Maldonado said that he is feeling “much more confident in the E23 and we’re learning a lot about it with all the laps we’re completing. I’m able to push when needed and everything about the whole package feels a lot more together than last year, especially if you remember where we were in terms of performance and reliability during the pre-season in 2014.”
Nobody was able to get in the 1:24.000’s on Saturday except Maldonado and Verstappen, which changed on Sunday when it was Romain Grosjean’s turn to set the fastest time in his Lotus at 1:24.067s.
Grosjean was followed by Mercedes‘ Nico Rosberg who lapped the track in 1:24.321s and Red Bull’s Daniil Kvyat who did a 1:24.941s. Fourth fastest was Sauber rookie Felipe Nasr who did a 1:24.956s.
The day was marked however by McLaren-Honda‘s Fernando Alonso hitting the wall between T3 and T4 shortly after midday. The Spaniard was taken to the track’s medical center before being airlifted to the hospital for further checks.
“It was a really good day until I crashed,” said Alonso. “Unfortunately I made a mistake at Turn 3, which is not the best place to do that, because the barriers are close at that point. I’d rather crash in the test than in Race 1, so I have learned something from it and now we turn the page, move on and think about next week’s test here.”
We’re happy Fernando is OK and in good spirits, as we’re curious to see if they can improve even further before the start of the regular season in Australia.
Unofficial Overall times from Barcelona
1. Romain Grosjean, Lotus, 1:24.067s, 111 laps
2. Nico Rosberg, Mercedes, 1:24.321s, 197 laps
3. Pastor Maldonado, Lotus, 1:24.348s, 173 laps
4. Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull, 1:24.574s, 202 laps
5. Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari, 1:24.584s, 164 laps
6. Felipe Massa, Williams, 1:24.672s, 143 laps
7. Sergio Perez, Force India, 1:24.702s, 155 laps
8. Max Verstappen, Toro Rosso, 1:24.739s, 223 laps
9. Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes, 1:24.923s, 201 laps
10. Daniil Kvyat, Red Bull, 1:24.941s, 216 laps
11. Felipe Nasr, Sauber, 1:24.956s, 152 laps
The teams will take three days off before final pre-season testing restarts in Barcelona on February 26th – March 1st.