Barcelona day 3: Max P2 after completing 130 laps

Published on 21 February 2015 by Mike Motilall

After Max Verstappen ended the morning session, on the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya in Barcelona, being first and with a great lead, the afternoon saw him doing numerous long runs but he was unable to improve on his time that he did in the morning. Only Pastor Maldonado saw an opportunity to dive under the time set by Max, leaving the talented Dutchman, after having done an impressive 130 laps, second in the standings.

The afternoon session starts calmly. The teams are waiting till it gets a little dryer. After little over half an hour, it is Red Bull Racing that sends Daniil Kvyat on his way to do a race simulation. In the meantime in his Sauber, Marcus Ericsson has found some speed and sees an opportunity to join the rest of the field regarding lap time.

During the first part of the afternoon, Max settles in for some long runs and sees the laps gradually increasing on the counter. At the Williams team Felipe Massa has handed over the steering wheel to Valtteri Bottas, who is focused on practicing pit stops almost the entire afternoon. Only at the end of the afternoon the Fin was able to get a time on the clocks.

McLaren-Honda experienced a frustrating day resulting in little time for Jenson Button in the car. The Englishman gets on track rather late in the afternoon after being able to do only twelve laps during the morning. Yet again their joy is short lived because the same problem regarding a seal, that has been haunting them since last Thursday, has emerged once more.  

Shortly before the final hour, the Toro Rosso team starts practicing numerous pit stops. After each lap, Max comes in and having done a tire change, he heads back out. During the final half hour the team is busy with Max practicing pit stops, when all of a sudden the red flag is shown. Button has halted at the end of the pit lane and Max at the beginning or turn 1. Neither issues are related. Max had been asked by the team to stop his car along the track because the clutch was starting to act up after having practiced the many pit stops.

At the end of the day, we spoke for a change with father Jos who, in very good spirit, reported to Verstappen.nl: “Today was a very important day for Max. He covered almost a double race distance, practiced pit stops and has driven with different tires. And most importantly, he has not made any mistakes. When the super softs were strapped on he dealt with that very professionally. He senses exactly how and when to get the best out of the tires. All is proceeding according to plan and the team is very happy with Max.”

“It is still anyone’s guess regarding the speed of the car. We are positive but not everyone is driving with full power and the latest updates, neither is Toro Rosso. The fastest time this morning was nice for the team and also good for Max, but once more, the most important thing for me is that he learns well and does not make any mistakes”, says Jos.

Max adds: “It was a good session and for the first time I have done more than one hundred laps on one day. We were able to tick off quite a number of things on our list, one of which was doing fast laps in the morning. The car felt good and it seems that we are improving it little by little. Compared to the test in Jerez I am feeling more and more confident with the car and am learning more about driving in the Formula 1.” For the time being, testing is over for Max in Barcelona. “I am very curious to see what kind of new stuff the engineers are able to produce for the last test next week.”

On Sunday Carlos Sainz will take over the steering wheel again of the Toro Rosso STR10 from Max. He will be doing the last day of testing. Tomorrow also you can expect a report of day four in Barcelona.

Second pre-season test - Barcelona day 3 - Saturday 21 February

Pos      Driver                 Car              Time                   Laps
1 	 Pastor Maldonado	Lotus	 	 1m24.348s		(104)
2 	 Max Verstappen	        Toro Rosso	 1m24.739s  +0.391	(130)
3 	 Lewis Hamilton	        Mercedes	 1m26.076s  +1.728	(101)
4 	 Marcus Ericsson	Sauber	 	 1m26.340s  +1.992	(53)
5 	 Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	 	 1m26.407s  +2.059	(105)
6 	 Daniil Kvyat		Red Bull	 1m26.589s  +2.241	(112)
7 	 Felipe Massa		Williams	 1m26.912s  +2.564	(55)
8 	 Pascal Wehrlein	Force India	 1m27.333s  +2.985	(81)
9 	 Valtteri Bottas	Williams	 1m27.556s  +3.208	(49)
10 	 Jenson Button		McLaren	         1m29.151s  +4.803	(24)