planetf1.com

Yeaaaaaahhh! Mercedes beat their lap total

Perhaps the official timers are testing too... practicing giving Seb pole position week in week out

"oh look! we can make him go 13 seconds quicker!"

The timing screens at the circuit briefly credited Valtteri Bottas with a 1m18s lap there. It's now been revised to 18 minutes - it was his first lap out of the pits after a spell in the garage.

Whats the live timings link, I want to see Rosbergs last ten lap times so i can work out if he's doing long runs or quick laps with a slow out lap etc

Buttons now come out as well and sets a good lap time for his first run 1:19:834 - of course we dont know the details of the run but its still information

BBC F1 technical analyst Gary Anderson in Jerez

"Felipe Massa's Ferrari made its first appearance at the top of the timesheets earlier this morning after two days of data-gathering. The car has actually been setting decent times all through the test but it doesn't look as consistent as the Lotus. At the moment, the Ferrari has the same problem as the Red Bull - once the front washes away, the driver can't get it back. Whereas the Lotus is much more pliable. However, it's clear from the times he was setting and the pattern of his runs that for a lot of his laps on Wednesday, Lotus's Romain Grosjean did not have a lot of fuel on board, and the fuel load has a dramatic effect on car behaviour."

What's up with Lotus?

Anyone know what was wrong with the tyres last year that prompted Pirelli to turn them into paper?

"The teams are battling with new Pirelli tyres this season, with softer sidewalls, and it may be that means they have to run either higher ride-heights to compensate for the movement in the tyres or run the cars stiffer. Higher ride-heights mean less downforce; stiffer cars means problems over bumps and kerbs. This test is about making those decisions, and they're made harder by the very aggressive surface of the track, which not only wears the tyres out quickly but produces grip the cars won't have elsewhere. This first test is a bit like taking a girlfriend out for the first time. Does she like steak or fish, red wine or white. It's an exploratory test and that might explain why Fernando Alonso chose not to be here. It's about running through job-lists and seeing what the car does - logging data. It doesn't matter who's driving it as long as they are competent."

Did grosjean take this long to come out on tuesday or is Kimi just not happy with the ice cream button?

Word from Lotus is that there's nothing to be alarmed about by Raikkonen's lack of action - the team is just making small tweaks to get the Finn settled in the E21.

yes... teams got used to it .... they fully understood how the tyres worked, what made them fall off the cliff and what would make them last longer (except for merc-gp that is)... basically what would have happened is that teams would have built their cars around those tires as good as possible to make them last longer and thus gain an advantage - good for the teams but bad for the show

pirelli saw that coming and built a new tyre - not only compound- but also structure-wise... softer compound, softer flanks, harder-edged flanks... that should account for more pitstops and more action on the track... also pirelli aim at opening up more options strategy-wise...

a good info on the new tyres from bbc's gary anderson:

5 element front wing!

isn't that going to be heavier than the usual wings?

I love how Mercedes/Brawn always come up with new innovations every year. They may not work, but at least they're trying something different!

71 laps for Rosberg so far. They desperately need the mileage.

5 element front wing!