2026 Pre-Season Testing

[djos]

Some driver interviews from day 1.

The key takeaway for me is much less aero load (downforce), and much more torque/power out of corners. So it sounds like slower into and through the corners, but very fast exiting.

[CHT]

Some driver interviews from day 1.

The key takeaway for me is much less aero load (downforce), and much more torque/power out of corners. So it sounds like slower into and through the corners, but very fast exiting.

lots of new discoveries for the drivers due to the new PU and trying to out the best way around different corners.
Wonder if this heavy torque engine benefit some driving style over others.

[Roman]

Mercedes not running today due to the weather forecast

[FittingMechanics]

Weather looked better overnight (rain in afternoon), now it shows small amounts of rain for the most of the day. I think a lot of the teams will skip it.

Ferrari is first on track.

[Cassius]

Max on track

https://x.com/SoyMotor/status/2016062849630495171

Source: SoyMotor

[FW17]

Max on track


Source: SoyMotor

[basti313]

Weather looked better overnight (rain in afternoon), now it shows small amounts of rain for the most of the day. I think a lot of the teams will skip it.

Ferrari is first on track.

Big question is the temperature still:
Maybe this morning is even one of the best occasions to run this week albeit the temps being quite low. Afternoon will be wet and windy, so useless.
Cloud coverage with spots of rain tomorrow and Thursday forecasted, with not much wind all day, so might stay damp long time.
Friday will be good.

[FittingMechanics]

Weather looked better overnight (rain in afternoon), now it shows small amounts of rain for the most of the day. I think a lot of the teams will skip it.

Ferrari is first on track.

Big question is the temperature still:
Maybe this morning is even one of the best occasions to run this week albeit the temps being quite low. Afternoon will be wet and windy, so useless.
Cloud coverage with spots of rain tomorrow and Thursday forecasted, with not much wind all day, so might stay damp long time.
Friday will be good.

Yeah plus weather can change for the other days. Probably good idea to get some running for teams that did no running yesterday.

I'm guessing Verstappen probably runs his own schedule.

[motobaleno]

any link for laptimes?

[Cassius]

Weather looked better overnight (rain in afternoon), now it shows small amounts of rain for the most of the day. I think a lot of the teams will skip it.

Ferrari is first on track.

Big question is the temperature still:
Maybe this morning is even one of the best occasions to run this week albeit the temps being quite low. Afternoon will be wet and windy, so useless.
Cloud coverage with spots of rain tomorrow and Thursday forecasted, with not much wind all day, so might stay damp long time.
Friday will be good.

Yeah plus weather can change for the other days. Probably good idea to get some running for teams that did no running yesterday.

I'm guessing Verstappen probably runs his own schedule.

He is running with aero rakes, so today looks like aero focused testing. Yesterday was probably PU/cooling related testing. RB decided probably it is more beneficial to already have the data a few days earlier vs the risk of losing some laps of running due to rain.

[woocasz]

any link for laptimes?

so far Charles did 1.20.8

[motobaleno]

any link for laptimes?

so far Charles did 1.20.8

many thanks.
unofficial time confirmed also here
https://www.planetf1.com/news/f1-testin ... -barcelona

[basti313]

Big question is the temperature still:
Maybe this morning is even one of the best occasions to run this week albeit the temps being quite low. Afternoon will be wet and windy, so useless.
Cloud coverage with spots of rain tomorrow and Thursday forecasted, with not much wind all day, so might stay damp long time.
Friday will be good.

Yeah plus weather can change for the other days. Probably good idea to get some running for teams that did no running yesterday.

I'm guessing Verstappen probably runs his own schedule.

He is running with aero rakes, so today looks like aero focused testing. Yesterday was probably PU/cooling related testing. RB decided probably it is more beneficial to already have the data a few days earlier vs the risk of losing some laps of running due to rain.

Yes. Still wind is already strong now, was 3bft all morning and now 4 with the rain starting. Not the best time to do aero...but this is the difficulty, no one knows if it gets better this week, there are forecasts for 4bft even on Friday.

I generally like the frontloading approach. Get the data as early as possible. This is what I always tell our engineers, most projects suffer from lacking frontloading...I never had a project where frontloading hurt the project.

[motobaleno]

https://it.motorsport.com/f1/news/f1-te ... /10793146/

1.20.0 for Max

[Emag]

Did anyone else run except for Max and Leclerc today? Seems like a burner day.