Barcelona day 1: Rosberg puts Mercedes on top

The second week of pre-season testing started today in Barcelona, and Nico Rosberg was fastest.

In Jerez, Mercedes faced a few problems on the car, and this was the same story here. Rosberg had to jump out of the car in the morning because of a gearbox problem. However during the last 30 minutes of the afternoon session, Rosberg posted a time of 1:22.965 on the medium compound tyres (white marking).

Kimi Räikkönen became second fastest, and only 0.007 seconds slower than the German, moments after Rosberg had set his time. The Iceman was also using the medium compound tyres, showing Mercedes could bring a stronger fight this season if their car is more reliable.

In his first day of testing in 2013, Fernando Alonso set a lap time of 1:22.952 in his new Ferrari F138 – branded with the UPS logo following a new sponsorship deal. He completed 110 laps of the circuit – the only driver to do more than 90 laps.

Even though he was at the top of the timing charts for the majority of the day, the defending World Champion, Sebastian Vettel, could only set a lap that was good enough for 4th fastest.

After launching the new Williams FW35 earlier on in the morning, Pastor Maldonado drove the new car fast enough for 5th place - 1:23.733. In 6th was Daniel Ricciardo, continuing to prove that the Toro Rosso has impressive pace.

McLaren driver Sergio Pérez was 7th, a fraction ahead of Paul di Resta in his Force India VJM06.

There were two stoppages during the day, for Gutiérrez and Pic – 9th and 11th respectively.

Max Chilton was 10th fastest.

The photo's of today are from MSP.lu.

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