Kevin Magnussen felt no rust as he made F1 comeback with Renault

The Dane's last competitive experience in F1 was when he stood in for the injured Fernando Alonso at McLaren in Australia last year, though he failed to start the grand prix.

He parted ways with McLaren at the end of 2015 after spending the year as reserve but got a lifeline when the deal between Pastor Maldonado's sponsor PDVSA and Renault collapsed.

After Palmer performed driving duties for Renault on the opening two days of the first pre-season test at Barcelona, Magnussen took over on Wednesday and completed 109 laps.

When asked if it took him time to get back to his best, Magnussen said: "It didn't feel like that today.

"I felt completely normal. I didn't feel unconfident.

"That was really good. I was quite nervous going in.

"I forgot the feeling a little bit. I got it again. It's good.

"Getting so many laps on the first day was a good chance to get back into it."

Magnussen was pleased with Renault's efforts so far but knows there is a long way to go.

"We have a lot of work to do," he said. "The base balance of the car, the characteristic of the balance is quite good - at least I think so for my driving style.

"It's quite easy to drive and predictable, which is a good base.

"But you always need more downforce and power, so hopefully it will stay like that when that goes on the car."

Magnussen stopped twice on track during Wednesday's session but said both instances were precautionary.

"The stops we had were just precautions because there were some things on the data that looked wrong," he said.

"We stopped the car just for safety and there wasn't a problem so we were able to go back out again."