Barcelona F1 test: Hamilton tops rain-hit final morning

Rain marred the first few hours of running, but at least offered a chance to sample the wet and intermediate tyres.

A brief period of respite in the weather then allowed most teams to put in a reasonable number of slick-shod laps before the next shower shortly before the lunch break.

Hamilton and Mercedes were first to give slicks a go and were soon on top.

There followed a frantic period of improvements as teams experimented with how various compounds of slick tyre behaved on a drying track.

Felipe Massa, Jules Bianchi and Jenson Button all appeared at the head of the order, before Hamilton reclaimed the top spot with a 1m23.282s on medium Pirellis.

Button completed the morning second for McLaren, 0.351 seconds behind, followed by Jean-Eric Vergne's Toro Rosso and Bianchi's Force India.

There were plenty of red flags and incidents when the weather was at its worst.

Massa slid into the gravel at Turn 4 just 10 minutes into the morning, Giedo van der Garde put his Caterham off at the final corner, and both Sauber's Esteban Gutierrez and Vergne had similar incidents at Turn 5.

Webber parked his Red Bull with an issue just as Gutierrez caused his stoppage, and van der Garde prompted a fifth red flag when he stopped after Campsa just before lunch.

Valtteri Bottas did not set a flying lap time as Williams was focused on pitstop practice, but did complete 23 in/out-laps.

Morning times

Pos  Driver               Team             Time       Gap     Laps
 1.  Lewis Hamilton        Mercedes        1m23.282s           44 
 2.  Jenson Button         McLaren         1m23.633s  +0.351   31 
 3.  Jean-Eric Vergne      Toro Rosso      1m24.071s  +0.789   37 
 4.  Esteban Gutierrez     Sauber          1m25.239s  +1.957   24 
 5.  Jules Bianchi         Force India     1m25.732s  +2.450   51 
 6.  Giedo van der Garde   Caterham        1m27.429s  +4.147   23 
 7.  Felipe Massa          Ferrari         1m27.563s  +4.281   47 
 8.  Mark Webber           Red Bull        1m27.616s  +4.334   34 
 9.  Max Chilton           Marussia        1m29.902s  +6.620   21 
10.  Romain Grosjean       Lotus           1m34.800s  +11.518  19 
11.  Valtteri Bottas       Williams        no time             23 

AUTOSPORT special testing coverage:

Gallery Testing blog Technical blog Live commentary Trackside analysis