Ten things we learned from the first F1 test

The long wait from the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix last November to the first 2015 cars turning a wheel in anger came to an end this week, as eight teams rolled into Spain to kick off pre-season testing at Jerez.

Every year the teams declare that the former grand prix venue offers little valuable running, but every year they are enticed back. Perhaps the lack of revealing data is a convenience at this early stage of their cars' development.

Still, four days of getting to see the cars up close on track, and speaking to paddock figures who know more than they often care to let on in public, always reveals some interesting pointers at this time of year.

Of course it's early days - we all know that - but here are the key trends picked up by our team that was on the ground at Jerez for the first test.

RENAULT STILL HAS WORK TO DO

Jonathan Noble (@NobleF1)

Daniel Ricciardo's comedic hesitation on Sunday when replying about whether Renault had made a step forward with its engines was the first clue that perhaps all was not as well as had been hoped for the French manufacturer.

"Err. Yeah. To be honest yes... we've err... yes," he said, when asked if the 2015 Renault was better. "I won't go into too much detail."

It later emerged that a problem with a small metallic shaft related to the ERS water pump had been a cause for concern, prompting reliability fears that ultimately compromised Red Bull's and Toro Rosso's running.

Further issues - with the battery and ERS - over the week highlighted that Renault still has plenty of scope for improvement as it heads to the next test at Barcelona.

Only when the power unit is able to run at its maximum will Red Bull know just how much of a step it has made in closing the gap to Mercedes.

FERRARI IS ON THE RIGHT TRACK

Ben Anderson (@BenAndersonAuto)

OK, Ferrari topped the first day of pre-season testing in 2014 too, and look how that turned out. But this year felt a bit different.

The Scuderia was fastest on three of the four days of running at Jerez this week, and its engine customer Sauber topped the other (and was second fastest the rest of the time).

Sauber was genuinely surprised by how much better this year's Ferrari engine is compared to last year's, which was so slow and so heavy that the Swiss team failed to score a point for the first time since it first entered F1 in 1993, while the Scuderia failed to win a race for the first time since that same season.

Many heads rolled at Maranello after that unacceptable anomaly, and it seems progress has been immediate. Kimi Raikkonen reckoned the SF15-T was a "completely different story" to last year's car, while Nico Rosberg described Ferrari newboy Sebastian Vettel's medium-shod headline time on day two as an "eye-opener".

Ferrari has definitely made progress, but it expects Mercedes will remain out of reach. The hope will be that it can exploit Red Bull-Renault's current struggles to become the three-pointed star's closest challenger when the 2015 season starts for real.

MERCEDES IS STILL THE TEAM TO BEAT

Edd Straw (@eddstrawf1)

The fastest Mercedes laptime at Jerez was 1.141s off the outright pace, but pay no heed to that. Few doubt that 2014's dominant team is in anything other than a very strong position.

Why? Well, some facts. First, the fastest Mercedes time on every day was set on medium rubber (a switch to softs should be worth, at a very conservative estimate, a second).

Second, the car looks comfortably the strongest trackside. Third, why would a team that dominated last year have any motivation to showboat at the top of the timesheets?

The more relevant indicators are that Mercedes was delighted with the test. Both drivers reported that the car felt relatively similar to last year even in its unrefined state. And on day one, Rosberg completed a staggering 157 laps, with the team running out of things to do, switching to pitstop practice late on.

There were a few minor problems: a water leak on day two, Lewis Hamilton's spin on a drying track on day four. But overall, this was as successful a first test as could have been hoped for.

"Paddy [Lowe]'s just said that has been one of our highest weeks of mileage, so it's been a surprise for us all," said Hamilton. "It's just great to see the enthusiasm of all the guys in the garage."

With Mercedes banking almost 1500 miles of running over four days, and the car looking good, there's less cause for enthusiasm in rival garages.

RED BULL AXIS IS STRONGER

Glenn Freeman (@glenn_autosport)

The idea of two teams with common ownership not working as closely as they could is a strange one to get your head around, but Red Bull and Toro Rosso have strengthened their ties on the technical side ahead of 2015 to take advantage of now being the only Renault-powered squads.

The relationship seemed to benefit the smaller outfit more this week, as Toro Rosso logged laps while working around problems with the Renault engine that stifled Red Bull's progress from the beginning of the test.

But the fact that the teams now share a common installation of the Renault power unit means that there is a chance the 353 laps logged by Carlos Sainz Jr and Max Verstappen can be of use to Red Bull - which only managed 166 over the four days.

As Toro Rosso technical chief James Key put it: "It's a common approach. It's not a Red Bull or a Toro Rosso - it's a Renault installation. It gives Renault fewer headaches to work with, and I think it will help us find solutions quickly."

HONDA MUST LIFT ITS GAME

Jonathan Noble

Renault found out the hard way 12 months ago about just how hard the new V6 turbo power units were to get on top of, when its Jerez test turned into a nightmare.

This time around it was Honda that faced the brunt of reliability problems as its new relationship with McLaren got off to a stuttering start.

A tally of 12 laps over the first two days - and the slowest lap times on each day - was certainly not what the team or Japanese engine manufacturer had been expecting.

But even with the dramas, there remains a conviction that the situation will improve dramatically over the final two tests thanks to upgraded engines that are being prepared right now.

McLaren knows that the ultra-tight packaging of its MP4-30 carried with it the risk that when things go wrong, they can take an awful long time to fix, which is exactly what happened with a spate of sensor problems and operational matters.

But equally, the aerodynamic and engine data that was being produced when the car ran offered some encouraging signs that leave the team confident it will be challenging for a decent haul of points by the time the Australian GP comes around.

LIVERIES DO MATTER

Edd Straw

The majority of the cars running at Jerez were decked in familiar colours, even the new McLaren-Honda, which had been tipped to be launched with a very different scheme.

But the one team that dared to be different was Red Bull. The camouflage livery (which rather than rendering it invisible made the car look like a Mercedes from a distance on-track) attracted huge attention - and media coverage - when the car broke cover on Sunday.

It's a reminder that motorsport made its name being a colourful and vibrant sport. And perhaps a reminder to more conservative teams that there's a lot to be said for putting some extra effort into a special testing livery.

So, as a note to all F1 teams for next season: get creative with your paintbrushes and vinyl wraps.

NEW CARS ARE FASTER

Jonathan Noble

There had been a lot of speculation over the winter about the step forward in speed that the 2015 cars were expected to make, and Jerez appeared to prove that right.

Kimi Raikkonen's fastest time from the four days of the test - 1m20.841s - was well clear of the benchmark from last year: 1m23.276s set by Kevin Magnussen.

Of course, it's only the first test and the step forward in pace could be down to a host of things, not least the amount of fuel the teams chose to run.

But it's clear that for the established manufacturers there is a huge growth in confidence about the power units they are running, which has helped lift speeds because they can be operated at the maximum.

We now just need to see if that progress follows through to Barcelona.

One other notable consequence of the increased commitment to pushing the power units was that they sounded louder too.

However, it is unclear about whether that was as a result of the topographical nature of Jerez - with the sound bouncing off the hills that surround the circuit - or simply because people had forgotten what the 2014 engines sounded like.

ONLY SAUBER HAS SHOWN ITS HAND

Ben Anderson

As soon as Felipe Nasr went fastest on day three of the Jerez test, accusations of glory runs on soft tyres by a team in desperate need of sponsorship abounded.

Nasr himself didn't do a great deal to dispel these suspicions, saying: "To be honest, I don't feel we're going to be leading sessions in this car in other situations, but nevertheless it feels good to finish first.

"I wouldn't say it was maximum performance, but they were decent runs on the soft tyres.

"I think we could still get some margin on the car to improve that [the laptime], but in general it was good."

After team-mate Marcus Ericsson wound up second fastest behind Kimi Raikkonen the following day, the Swede moved to quell these suspicions by insisting the team left some significant margin with the amount of performance it had allowed the C34 to show.

There is no doubt the headline times flatter Sauber relative to big hitters like Mercedes and Ferrari. Sauber is more delighted by the fact that improvements to its Ferrari-engined package have put it ahead of fellow midfielders Toro Rosso and Lotus at this stage.

The C34 is undoubtedly a better car than its predecessor. Whether this is enough to genuinely lift it up the grid remains to be seen.

LOTUS HAS BANISHED ITS NIGHTMARE

Jonathan Noble

After a terrible 2014 campaign where problems with Renault meant it fell far short of the victory challenges of 2013, Lotus appears to be back in the game.

Its switch to Mercedes power was always aimed at allowing the team a decent step forward in performance, with the clear target of being able to do what Williams did when it went from ninth overall to emerge as a regular podium finisher in 2014.

And although it's too early to say if it can reach the giddy heights that Williams managed, Jerez did at least show that Lotus is far away from the woeful time it had on occasion last season.

As Romain Grosjean said when asked if the new package was better: "Big-time! Of course everyone was very much expecting to see [this with] our first feeling of the car, as much with the power unit as with the chassis.

"Everything has been going in the right direction, so that's very positive.

"We did 50-something laps, and I enjoyed driving of all of them. We have some more bits and pieces coming for Barcelona, but in general it's a very good starting point."

WILLIAMS QUIETLY CONFIDENT

Edd Straw

Williams kept a low profile at Jerez, with its car generally buried in the middle of the timing screens and a fastest lap 1.435s off the pace.

But there's a quiet confidence from everyone in the team. Valtteri Bottas and Felipe Massa were both happy with their first taste of the car at Jerez. But neither was willing to say too much.

The Williams was a strong car last year, but it did lack downforce and the strong front-end on turn-in was offset by the rear being a little less stable. Massa confirmed both the stability and balance were "a step forward", which bodes well for downforce levels even with the disadvantage of the new nose regulations.

Chief technical officer Pat Symonds played it coy, much as you would expect from someone who has been in F1 for almost three-and-a-half decades.

"I'm happy with where we are and I don't really want to answer that question in any quantifiable way," he said when asked by AUTOSPORT about whether Williams had made a net downforce gain from the end of 2014 to this year.

But he did also concede that "we have certainly taken steps that I hope will move us forward".

While the car is evolutionary, there are some detail changes to the suspension that should also help the mechanical platform.

The race simulation runs later in testing might be the first real sign we get of where Williams really stands.