Barcelona F1 test: Felipe Massa fastest on day three morning

The Brazilian fitted a set of super-softs and lit up the timing screens with a 1m23.262s on a three-lap run, as most teams started to focus on qualifying simulations.

Massa ended the morning with 44 laps on the board, 0.014s clear of Raikkonen's super-soft lap.

However, Massa's time was half-a-second slower than Nico Rosberg's Barcelona test-leading time, which was set on the softs on Friday in the Mercedes.

It was a busy morning for Massa, who did six short runs of five or six laps on the mediums before single runs on the softs and super-softs.

Raikkonen and Ferrari lost some time to an electrical problem, which combined with some "pre-planned work" resulted in a long stay in the garage. However the Finn still surpassed 50 laps.

World champion Lewis Hamilton focused on running the medium compound tyre, kicking off the day with a 14-lap run straight out of the box.

The Mercedes driver then completed four short stints, setting the sixth fastest time, but he ended the session 45 minutes early so the team could start work on experiential set-up changes for the afternoon.

Sauber's Marcus Ericsson was third quickest with a late run on the super-softs, 1.2s off the pace.

Force India, which only ran its 2015 car for the first time on Friday, showed good reliability as Nico Hulkenberg clocked up 75 laps - the highest tally of the morning.

Hulkenberg was fourth quickest, but his super-soft lap was 1.7s slower than Massa.

Behind him on the leaderboard was Kevin Magnussen, who managed 38 laps for McLaren on his first appearance of 2015 as a substitute for the recovering Fernando Alonso.

Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo - who has taken over from team-mate Daniil Kvyat for the remainder of this test - was seventh as he, like Hamilton, focused on running the medium tyre.

Toro Rosso's Carlos Sainz Jr and Romain Grosjean in the Lotus completed the timesheets.

DAY THREE TIMES