Ferrari stronger than it looks in Abu Dhabi

On the face of it, a Formula 1 finale in Abu Dhabi should represent good news for Ferrari. The Scuderia has improved its engine substantially this season, to the point where Mercedes' Niki Lauda reckons it's on a par with his team's power unit, and the Yas Marina circuit is a sequence of long straights punctuated by a sequence of short 90-degree turns of the type that Sebastian Vettel thrived on in Singapore.

But a glance at the headline times suggests Ferrari is struggling here, particularly in the final sector of lap, where most of those 90-degree twists are situated.

Vettel was only fifth fastest in the all-important second free practice session on Friday evening - crucial because it is the only session that takes place in conditions representative of those F1 competitors will face come qualifying and the race. Owing to the high heat of the daytime, FP1 and FP3 are, to borrow Sergio Perez's phrasing, "a bit useless".

Vettel's team-mate Kimi Raikkonen was only seventh quickest, and the gap from the fastest Ferrari to the fastest Mercedes (driven by Nico Rosberg) was over seven tenths of a second. More than half a second of that deficit came in the final sector of the lap, where both Mercedes, both Red Bulls, Perez's Force India, and even Fernando Alonso's McLaren were faster than the red cars.

Pacesetter Rosberg ran with a detuned "very old" engine on Friday © LAT

PACE RANKING (Super-soft tyre)
1. Mercedes (Rosberg) 1m41.983s
2. Force India (Perez) 1m42.610s
3. Red Bull (Ricciardo) 1m42.647s
4. Ferrari (Vettel) 1m42.717s
5. McLaren (Alonso) 1m42.955s
6. Lotus (Maldonado) 1m43.431s
7. Williams (Bottas) 1m43.441
8. Toro Rosso (Verstappen) 1m43.662s
9. Sauber (Nasr) 1m44.116s
10. Manor (Stevens) 1m47.022s

Of course Ferrari and Williams will go quicker when it comes to qualifying and more powerful engine settings are used, but the gap to Mercedes is still a large one, and it's worth noting that Rosberg detuned his own "very old" power unit (which is about to attempt to complete its seventh race in succession) to protect it for the business end of the weekend.

The picture doesn't look much better on the harder compound tyre, where Ferrari trailed Red Bull by 0.119 seconds and was a whopping 1.470s slower than Lewis Hamilton's pacesetting Mercedes.

PACE RANKING (Soft tyre)
1. Mercedes (Hamilton) 1m42.524s
2. Red Bull (Ricciardo) 1m43.875s
3. Ferrari (Raikkonen) 1m43.994s
4. Force India (Perez) 1m44.362s
5. Williams (Massa) 1m44.442s
6. Toro Rosso (Verstappen) 1m44.684s
7. Lotus (Maldonado) 1m44.797s
8. McLaren (Button) 1m45.092s
9. Sauber (Nasr) 1m45.324s
10. Manor (Stevens) 1m47.717s

"We are a little bit too far behind, we have to improve," admitted Vettel after the session. "I would like the gap to be smaller and also for the gap to be bigger to the cars behind. Force India was surprisingly quick, also the Red Bulls, so there's a lot of work for us."

Force India was naturally the talk of the town after the session, owing to Perez's eye-catching laptime on the super-soft. Both the Mexican and team-mate Nico Hulkenberg (who was only fractionally slower than the Ferraris and Red Bulls himself) reckoned this was a fair reflection of the VJM08's competitiveness.

"It should be representative," said Hulkenberg. "FP2 is the only real representative session, because this is the time of the day we are doing to qualify and race at. I don't think others were sandbagging."

Perez, who had to halt his running early after a problem with his left-rear brake pads, added: "Obviously the Ferraris and the Red Bulls put the [quick] lap [in] a bit earlier than us so there is a bit of track improvement there, but it was still a very strong lap.

Perez caught the eye with the third-fastest time behind the Mercedes drivers © XPB

"It's the best Friday [of the season] not because of the position, but because of the gap to the Mercedes. Six tenths away, we have never been that close."

Perez is correct to reference the timing of his lap. He did his 'qualifying simulation' later than the other frontrunners, so likely benefited from a grippier circuit. This was also true for Alonso, whose McLaren-Honda was surprisingly fast over one lap.

Force India should expect to slip back a bit on Saturday, when qualifying engine modes are deployed, and it will probably be looking at filling the bottom two slots in Q3 in reality, rather than realistically fighting Ferrari, Red Bull and probably Williams for the higher spots on the grid.

That said, Hulkenberg qualified fifth on merit in Brazil last time out, so perhaps the VJM08 really could be a Saturday contender for row three at least.

What Force India likely won't be doing is challenging for the podium on Sunday, unless it gets lucky. Analysis of the longer runs on both types of tyre suggests the Silverstone-based squad is struggling badly compared to other leading cars.

But this is also where things take a turn for the better for Ferrari fans.

LONG RUN RANKING (Super-soft)
1. Ferrari (Raikkonen) 1m47.390s (8-lap average)
2. Red Bull (Kvyat) 1m47.615s (6-lap average)
3. Mercedes (Rosberg) 1m47.655s (8-lap average)
4. Toro Rosso (Sainz) 1m48.049s (5-lap average)
5. Lotus (Maldonado) 1m48.083s (5-lap average)
6. Force India (Hulkenberg) 1m48.480s (8-lap average)
7. Williams (Bottas) 1m48.686s (8-lap average)
8. Sauber (Nasr) 1m49.853s (5-lap average)
9. McLaren (Button) 1m49.962s (5-lap average)
10. Manor (Stevens) 1m52.028s (8-lap average)

Ricciardo has an outside shot at being a contender this weekend © XPB

Raikkonen completed a 17-lap marathon stint on the super-soft tyre, which Pirelli estimates is 1.2s faster than the soft. Not only was the Finn 0.265s per lap faster than Rosberg over a comparative stint, he also held on to the tyre for three more laps before his times dropped off to a similar level to Rosberg's.

So the SF-15T looks to hold a slight edge on degradation at this stage as well, which may come in handy given Pirelli is predicting a two-stop race on Sunday.

What we don't know is how much Rosberg can improve when he turns his engine up, and also how fast world champion Hamilton can go. The Brit admitted to failing to extract the most from the super-soft tyre on his quick lap, while his long runs on both compounds were slower than Rosberg's.

Hamilton was a substantial 0.747s per lap adrift on the soft tyre, a gap that is unlikely to remain so large later in the weekend. In fact, Rosberg's running suggests Mercedes could restore an edge over the Scuderia on the harder of the two compounds.

LONG RUN RANKING SOFT
1. Mercedes (Rosberg) 1m46.841s (6-lap average)
2. Ferrari (Vettel) 1m47.096s (6-lap average)
3. Red Bull (Ricciardo) 1m47.403s (6-lap average)
4. Williams (Bottas) 1m48.055s (6-lap average)
5. Lotus (Maldonado) 1m48.858s (6-lap average)
6. Toro Rosso (Verstappen) 1m49.050s (6-lap average)
7. Force India (Perez) 1m49.495s (6-lap average)
8. Sauber (Nasr) 1m49.587s (6-lap average)
9. McLaren (Button) 1m49.969s (6-lap average)
10. Manor (Stevens) 1m51.243s (6-lap average)

Red Bull again looks very quick over longer runs on both types of tyre, which bodes well on a circuit at which Daniel Ricciardo reckons he enjoyed one of his best races of last season, when he charged from a pitlane start to fourth.

"We're pretty much 95 per cent to where we want to be, so it's good for a Friday," Ricciardo said. "Force India were strong, they surprised us, probably more than we surprised ourselves.

"Always on Saturday, the Ferrari and Williams seem to make a bit more of a step. We can maybe find a little bit more but probably not a whole lot more.

"Today was pretty representative of our pace. Hopefully the others don't close the gap too much."

Ferrari will no doubt be working hard to close what looks like a significant gap to Mercedes in qualifying, but if the Scuderia can somehow genuinely get either of its cars ahead of the W06s then it could have the pace to pose a genuine threat to Mercedes' hegemony in race trim.

Ferrari is in better shape than it looks right now, but whether that shape is actually strong enough to beat Mercedes remains to be seen. On this season's previous evidence it's unlikely, but you never know.