F1 Barcelona pre-season testing live commentary and updates - day 3

DAY THREE COMES TO AN END

As James Vowles remarked today, Mercedes really is succeeding in running to the timetable it set for itself. Between them, George Russell and Kimi Antonelli completed almost three complete Spanish Grand Prix distances according to unofficial timing – 92 and 91 laps. They set the fastest times, too (1m17.362s and 1m17.580s, also unofficial), though again we cannot stress enough how irrelevant and unrepresentative this is.

Lando Norris completed 62 laps, 29 of which came in the afternoon after an extended lunchtime with the garage doors closed.

Both Alpine drivers were out – Franco Colapinto did 56 laps in the morning, Pierre Gasly (making his first appearance of the week) 51.

Oliver Bearman ran 42 laps after a mechanical issue which brought out the red flags in the morning session.

Arvid Lindblad was the only Racing Bulls driver in action today and completed an impressive 111 laps, making him the busiest driver of the day.

Nico Hulkenberg clocked up 60 laps in an Audi once again seemingly beset by technical issues.

'LordAzuren' asks:

"What is the general consensus about the development status of the cars actually on track? I ask because some cars shows quite evoluted designs while others seems way more "basics" in certain elements. How different can the cars be at Bahrein/Melbourne? Or, in other words, to what extent actual cars may be old designs/decepting ones?"

This is an interesting question and difficult to answer definitively. It does appear that a couple of teams are planning to add developments ahead of the Bahrain tests, while others have come to the Barcelona shakedown with relatively mature packages which they plan to leave alone – perhaps until after Melbourne.

There are lots of reasons for this. Some have put more resource into 2026 development from an early stage, others may have innovations in the pipeline they don't want others to see yet. Others might have encountered delays in the production process caused by the sheer difficulty of getting the cars near the weight limit. It is easy to give Williams a kick in the corporate ribs here but its failure to make the shakedown illustrates how perilous that final stage of the development process is.

A lot of it boils down to resource, and the way the constraints on aerodynamic research and spending now work. McLaren has been very pragmatic in saying that it wants to learn how its car behaves first before it crystallises its development priorities. As the constructors' champion it has the smallest windtunnel/CFD resource allocation under the 'sliding scale' of permitted development.

Also, given the opening races are all 'flyaways', it will be expensive to freight new components overseas – this now falls under the budget cap. Together with the fact that they will all be looking at one another to see which innovations are worth copying, it all points to there being a kind of fallow period before a concerted development push – the calm before the storm, if you like.

Another interesting excerpt from the press conference with James Vowles earlier:

"Yes, I have boots on the ground and individuals there [Barcelona]. It won't be a surprise to any of you, but I actually think we're set up for a good championship. I think Mercedes are doing well out of the box, running to the timetable they said they would.

"It's very impressive from the get-go. But equally, Red Bull, given they have produced a power unit from scratch, and that really cannot be underestimated, they did a brilliant job in the number of laps they completed. And then finally, there's Ferrari, which is exactly the same thing.

"Again, pretty impressive from the get-go. But your times in Barcelona are going to be largely irrelevant. It's really only in Bahrain that you'll start to see it."

'kgath' asks:
"Does McLaren (customer teams) need to do millage test on the engine when Mercedes as the engine supplier will do it for them? They can run a different test program all together and benefit from what merc learns."

The PU will have been tested on the dyno to establish a baseline on how many miles it can complete reliably / without losing performance. But how it behaves once installed in the car is a slightly different matter. For instance, Mercedes will know what the engine's cooling demands are and pass that on – it's up to the customers to ensure that their cars can meet those cooling demands. And this is an area where teams run right to the margins because any radiator intake aperture bigger than it needs to be is going to cost in terms of drag.

So this is just one thing the teams will be looking at. For the most part this is a systems check: the new PUs are vastly more complicated than before, so there's a lot to learn. On top of that there are more systems on the cars, such as the actuators for the active aero.

Also, having more customers is often a benefit because any lurking issues can be identified more quickly – especially if failures are common across teams, as in 2020 when the Merc powertrain had an inherent fault which only manifested itself in testing, and affected Williams as well as the Mercedes works team.

CRASH TEST DUMMIES

'Silverstone Guy' asks:

"From the Rev Vowles presser: 'one of those is in certain corresponding tests that go with it'. Williams admitting to the rumoured nose cone crash test failure without actually saying it. Am not sure missing one-third of testing days due to sheer incompetence is any better than admitting to a crash test failure?"

Well as the Crash Test Dummies (band) would say themselves: Mmmm Mmmm Mmmm Mmmm...

'Mickey Kinsey' asks: "Has there been any activity from the Aston Martin garage? I understand that they've skipped this part of testing so far, but I'm just curious as to if there's been anything at all from them."

Unfortunately it's looking like we're more likely to see Ricky Martin on track at this shakedown than Aston Martin. In which case various people at the factory will be Living La Vida Broke-a. 

CATS ENTERTAINMENT

'Hopkinsonfrank' asks: "And talking of cats, Stuart, are McLaren a bit like your tech expert today - not sure if they want to go out or stay in?"

Well, the McLaren garage doors have been closed for rather a long time this afternoon but Lando Norris has been spotted on track within the past hour – indeed there has been a veritable flurry of on-track action as the forecast drizzle failed to show up.

Perhaps Lando can learn from my cats – both highly skilled B&E artists. Closed doors are no barriers to these rogues...

'Banzai Kobayashi' asks: "Do you think the fact Leclerc continuously criticised the ability of his Ferrari to be performing in the wet those past few years may have contributed to him completing 64 laps yesterday - the most of the four drivers on track. Are these test only run for collecting general data about how the car is behaving or can you push a bit and try to find performance for possible (wet) race setups ?"

Lots of questions there. Firstly, given poor performance in the wet has been a common trait across several recent Ferraris, it would be prudent for the team to do some wet-weather running. Picking four sets of intermediates and two sets of full wets for its tyre allocation is a clear indicator that Ferrari wanted to take advantage of wet conditions – that isn't the most heavily balanced in terms of wet/inters across all the teams, but it is further along than others.

But in terms of data gathering and performance, all the teams really are in check-nothing-falls-off mode rather than exploring the limits of their cars.

'Devon_sky' asks: "Is it true that the issue HAAS had is mainly sensor related and not specifically a fault of the Ferrari PU?"

There are lots of ways to answer this kind of question. The first is to issue a gentle reminder to be wary of paying too much attention to goobers on social media (and indeed mainstream media) presenting as tech experts or purveyors of inside information. Both of my cats (Willow pictured) are equally qualified to discourse on detailed matters of technology and engineering as the majority of self-appointed tech 'experts', which is to say not at all.

Willow: has same engineering qualifications as social media F1 'tech experts'. Is probably superior at shinning up bookshelves.

That said, at lunchtime Oliver Bearman spoke about the issue that kept him in the garage this morning being the sort of thing which in previous years would have taken 30 minutes to fix, but the new PUs are an order more complex. That would point to the problem being along the lines of a sensor issue.

'MonzaGorilla' asks: "Were the drivers of the 90s/00s genuinely more outspoken, abrasive, uncontrolled and perhaps with a bit of prodding and ego manipulation, may have been more inclined to pass on information following secret tests like this? Or are modern drivers still the same beasts and present day PR would still have kept it under wraps?"

Well, I believe it was Martin Brundle who once said something along the lines that teams will put up with, uh-huh, 'difficult' personality types so long as they deliver the goods on track. In the modern era, though, F1 has become so technical in terms of what's required of the drivers that 'abrasive' types struggle with the teamwork required to optimise the car. We're a long way past just jumping in the car and wringing its neck.

That said, within the past decade or so there has been a driver who got into an actual physical altercation with the team chef over the thickness of his shaved parmesan...

PERSONALITY OF THE YEAR?

Here's another blast from the past. The magazine I worked for ran an annual 'Man of the Year' awards (hey, 1990s/2000s attitudes pictured), comprising various categories voted for by the readers, among which was 'Personality of the Year'.

And, lo, among the send-the-tea-boy jobs which fell to me at a Monza test was to help sort portrait photos of various candidates. The task required not only roping in the PRs and their drivers, but also to physically assist the photographer by holding one of those circular metallic reflectors. And not only that – this being the days before digital photography and the convenience of being able to instantly review the images, portraiture required a whole load more exposure-bracketing and faff. Thus the assistant also had to entertain the driver somehow to prevent them obeying instinct, i.e. to bog off at the earliest opportunity.

One of the favourites for 'Personality of the Year' was secretly something of a prima donna, and indeed it was made clear to us that he would not travel outside a strict radius from the team tent, or indeed hang about for very long – despite the accolade our readers were imminently to bestow upon him.

That dictated a sub-optimal spot between two team trucks, though it granted us a moment's amusement as we waited. No less an eminence than legendary Williams technical director Patrick Head marched past on his phone. Patrick, as you may know, is cursed with a voice that carries, so we were fascinated to hear the following:-

"NOW SEE HERE! WHAT I AM ABOUT TO TELL YOU IS HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL…"

Sadly, as he passed us, so too did a pair of V10-engined F1 cars at full chat down the pit straight, drowning out the trade secret which followed.

In short order Mr Personality turned up. My overriding impression was that he was manifesting the traits of Tourette's Syndrome, such was the quantity of Anglo-Saxon phraseology spilling from his mouth. One particular taboo word, actually derived from Old Norse if you believe the etymology in the Oxford English Dictionary, seemed a particular favourite, as if he had only just discovered it and particularly enjoyed the novel sensation of it rolling off the tongue.

If you have ever nurtured the belief that being a motor racing journalist is a glamorous profession, you have never had to stand in a breezy paddock wrangling a large and unwieldy reflector in an attempt to cast a bounteous and beautifying light upon the face of an individual who is loudly calling you (and everybody else within earshot) a see-you-next-Tuesday.

With the shots in the bag and Mr Personality stomping back to his tent effing and blinding to himself, the snapper turned to me and said, "Who in their right mind would vote for that prick?"

Temperature at the circuit has peaked around 10C today and is forecast to decline as the afternoon progresses, with a chance of drizzle in the forecast.

Pierre Gasly has been lapping in the Alpine this afternoon, taking over from Franco Colapinto who completed a respectable 56 laps this morning. So far a smoother day for 'Team Enstone'.

OH LORD WON'T YOU [ETC]

'Gambler' wants to know how the Mercedes is going. Well, Antonelli is running this afternoon and those helpful purveyors of unofficial timing claim he has done a lap of 1m17.362s – which, if accurate, is the fastest lap so far during the shakedown.

Spy imagery from hilltop observers indicates Antonelli has been running on the Pirelli C3 soft-compound tyre, whereas George Russell was on C1s this morning – the hardest of the family of compounds.

Interestingly, Mercedes hasn't bothered with the C2 'medium' in its allocation at all. It's picked eight sets of hards, 12 softs, four intermediates and one wet. Hence its choice not to run yesterday.

BEAR NECESSITIES

Oliver Bearman spoke to F1 TV at lunchtime.

"A lot of mileage is the plan," he said. "It's very early stages in this cycle of regulations and we've had so far up until now a very clean laps and very clean running.

"It was impressive to come from Fiorano, straight away do our 200 kilometres limit and arrive and be out at 9am two days later.

"This morning unfortunately we had a small issue but that's what this is all about really, we expect to have these issues. Everybody's learning the car, the new bits and procedures.

"So the problem that would have taken maybe 30 minutes with last year's car, since everybody knew it so well, took a lot longer just because there's a few more intricate details, and there's just so much more to the power unit compared with what we've been used to.

"The afternoon will be about getting back out there and finding more about what this car has to offer."

OUT AND BACK AGAIN

Arvid Lindblad's Racing Bulls spluttered to a halt on track while all this Q&A excitement has been unfolding. But although the car had to be recovered by a track vehicle, the issue was a minor one and Lindblad was soon engaging in lappery again.

MORE QUESTIONS

'Lotus109' wants to know something. But is it a known unknown or an unknown known?

"Do you think Verstappen’s spin and Hadjar’s crash indicates that the Red Bull is particularly tricky? Or that RBR is pushing harder than everyone else at this stage? Or both?"

I think it would be unwise to conjecture at this stage, given that Verstappen's spin occurred first thing in the morning on a cold track, on his out lap, at a not-that-fast corner while Hadjar smote the barrier at one of the fastest sections of the circuit. Coincidentally – Alanis Morissette would incorrectly describe it as ironic – Turn 5 is where Max had his moment of madness with George Russell in the Spanish GP last season.

But one thing we do know is that the torque delivery of the new-generation of engines is very different because of the greater influence of electrical power. It's possible, but by no means certain, that this could have been a factor. Max certainly wouldn't have been pushing hard enough to spin on an out-lap – indeed, nobody will be pushing the limits this week.

VOWLES MOVEMENT

In other news, Williams team principal James Vowles is going to be speaking to the media this afternoon so we will up-speed you once the round-table grilling is concluded.

SORDID FRIGHTFULNESS

'jvb123' has a request: "Give us as many/much diplomatic incidents, scurrilous goss, and sordid frightfulness as possible please. Anything to numb the pain of this pathetic 'secret testing' bollocks."

Your wish is my command, etc.

Well, my op ed piece on Friday in which I pointed out the likelihood that not very much would happen this week caused a bit of a kerfuffle. Some suggested I was having a bad day. The bit about watching paint dry was even (mis)quoted in a Dutch newspaper. But let's face it, testing, shakedowning, whatever you want to call it, can be a bit of a drag.

Whence, you ask, does my aversion to testing spring? Well from quite a few places actually.

Many years ago I was dispatched to a test in Valencia – not the street circuit, the motorcycle track outside the city. It was very much a send-the-tea-boy job, the purpose being to gather material for a feature centring on Juan Pablo Montoya, then a very hot property. It was to be a 'testing diary' and the idea was to present it as a first-person piece, ghost-written by your humble scribe, albeit with access to the man himself...

...who went on to avoid me all day and refuse to utter a word when I finally intercepted him, while the photographer was denied access to the garage, despite all this supposedly having been arranged and OK'd in advance. But I digress.

Anyhow, we repaired to another team's 'motorhome' (in those days, a collection of scaffolding pipes wrapped in tarpaulin with open sides, rather than the bomb-proof ziggurats with smoked windows of today) in the hope of blagging what might be the first and last coffee of the day. This team was known to be quite welcoming to the media, although its lead driver famously wasn't.

Coffee duly obtained, the snapper and I stowed ourselves at a corner table, all others being occupied by breakfasting mechanics. All of a sudden Grumpy Lead Driver arrived with his physio in tow, and they plonk themselves beside us. Grumpy Lead Driver had a copy of our magazine in his hands, which were literally shaking with rage.

A chill ran through me as I recalled that one of our columnists (still active in the F1 media so no names, no pack drill) had written something about him which was not only rather uncomplimentary, it was probably actionable in a civil court. By this point Grumpy Lead Driver was shaking his copy like a dog shredding a newspaper with its teeth, and turned to us brandishing what was left.

"Who writes this shit?" he said by way of a how-do-you-do.

There was no means of escape, apart from physically climbing over GLD and his physio or jumping out of the window. So with some trepidation I introduced myself as a member of staff on said organ.

"Who the fuck are you?" he thundered, now stabbing at the remnants of the mag. "I don't see your name in this piece of shit..."

I diplomatically pointed out the first two features, running to 16 pages in total, carrying my byline.  

"Oh," he sneered. "You write all the arse-kissing shit, do you?"

And with that he stomped off, tossing the tattered pages contemptuously to the floor. Heads by now had well and truly swivelled in our direction and conversation had abated.

Finally the silence was broken by the physio who said, in an accusing tone, "He was actually in a good mood today until he read that."

And then he too took his leave. Our coffee had gone mysteriously cold. All in all it was a bit like that time the Bee Gees walked out of the Clive Anderson chat show...

QUESTIONS QUESTIONS

'zen141' asks:

"Q: Considering Esteban Ocon did 49 laps out of 50 on one set of tyres at Jeddah in 2025, yet Pirelli could not guarantee their tyres for 25 laps out of 57 in Qatar, so forcing an extra mandatory pitstop, how do you think the new narrow Pirelli tyres will do in 2026?

"Worse or Better ?"

An interesting question indeed, but it's predicated to an extent on comparing apples and oranges. Qatar is a unique challenge to the tyres because not only is it composed almost entirely of high-speed corners which follow in quick succession, the cars use a lot of kerb. So not only is a lot of energy being put through the tyres continuously, there is the additional stress of the kerbs (especially if the tyre pops over the outer edge of the kerb).

It really has to be seen to be believed. Sadly there's no grandstand on the inside of the fast series of right-handers towards the end of the lap. But for the past two years I've borrowed a tabard and walked around the inside, where there is no fence and the Armco barrier is at most waist height. The cars come through there at a blisteringly fast speed, using all the road, and the tiniest misjudgement or moment of tyre slip can mean a detour into the gravel.

So I'm going to sit on the fence for now in terms of predicting how the tyres will go. But I can confidently predict that someone will find something to moan about – given that last year Pirelli gave the drivers what they asked for (less thermal degradation) and among the second-order consequences was very little overtaking.

WINGING IT

Yesterday may not have been a thrill a minute, but Ferrari tested a subtle nuance of the 2026 regulations.

GASLY BUSINESS?

Readers with decent mid-term memories may recall Pierre Gasly's unfortunate time at Red Bull began with a series of testing shunts. We've run the ruler over whether Isack Hadjar's crash in the Barcelona shakedown yesterday bodes ill...

AUDI THEY DO THAT

Word reaches us that the Audi has been seen on track once more. Thank you trackside spies, now back to your secret hidey-holes before the dogs find you!

'Simon Smith' has an inquiry: "Someone else has asked something similar - but I'm wondering it too.

"Give us a little 'inside baseball' on this one. How are you covering the not-a-test? Do you have people at the track, near the track, or people who know people near the track?"

Well here's a thing. It always gives us a bit of amusement when people of the blowhard persuasion bang on about 'biased British journalism' on our sites when Fil - to name but one staffer - is (a) Belgian; and (b) lives in Barcelona. As you can imagine he's not hanging out near the track today, since he was running the live coverage this morning, but Motorsport.com(ES) editor Jose has a friend keeping an eye on things from a nearby hilltop. He's standing down today (it's cold up there) but Mcom(ES) staffer Pol will be taking over tomorrow.

Overall this is very much a tag-team effort between the various bits of the Motorsport Network, highly necessary given the sporadic nature of the on-track running and the borderline fascist policing of the circuit boundaries.

'd_e_s_s_i_e' – a username that looks like a part-completed Hangman puzzler – asks: "Why is this test (which isn't a test) three days spead over five days? Why not just a three-day test? Why not let them run on all five days? I assume there's a good reason."

Well they do say that you should never assume, because it makes an ass out of u and me, but in this case the non-test-test was set up to cater for the possibility of bad weather and teams potentially arriving late, or wanting/needing to spend time analysing data or debugging. Hence offering the (theoretical) level playing field offered by being able to run over three days out of the five available.

In temps perdu, of course, teams could book tracks such as Barcelona for as long as they wanted, when they wanted (unless it was being used for something else). And there was so little public interest in F1 back then that you could just wave your business card at the guy in the security gate and they would let you in.

If there is an appetite, I can relate some tales of testing from years past, including a diplomatic incident...

Although I'm preferring unforgeable refrained madmen for Baron Emmanuel de Graffenried.

Fascinatingly, jungle fauna amino is an anagram of Juan Manuel Fangio.

AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION

Now this is what I like to see. In the comments, 'jvb123'  adumbrates a marvellous parlour game to while away the time.

"After yesterday's Scrabble tournament, I suggest a Countdown contest. Pencil relief is an anagram of Filip Cleeren, and curdling stoat is an anagram of Stuart Codling. Now over to the readers to see what they can do with the Drivers' names..."

Yes, yes, and yes! Go...

As a reminder, Ferrari is not running today – digesting lessons from its first day of running yesterday etc – and neither is Cadillac. Williams will not be participating at all, and Aston Martin's plans are up in the air.

Oh to be a fly on the wall in the argument between Aston Martin's team principal and most senior technical manager over who is responsible for the lateness...!

As we reached the half-way point of day three of this shakedown, George Russell had completed 92 laps in his W17, a figure we have been able to verify. Unofficial timing sources claim 61 laps for Arvid Lindblad (Racing Bulls), 56 for Franco Colapinto (Alpine), 33 for Lando Norris (McLaren), 21 for Oliver Bearman (Haas), and five for Nico Hulkenberg (Audi).

The Audi was last seen being removed to the garages on a flatbed truck.

In terms of unofficial timing, Russell is reportedly the fastest so far on 1m17.580s but, as is the case throughout this week, lap times mean nothing. Not that this stops people wanting to know what they are... but remember, as William Shatner discovered in The Horror At 37,000 Feet, curiosity killed the Shat.

So, yes, TOTP from April 8, 1976 also featured an early music video, from proto boy band The Bay City Rollers, who were at number 20 with Love Me Like I Love You. For reasons never fully explained to me at the time or since, my sister possessed two copies of their eponymous album.

What was number one, I (don't) hear you ask? Save All Your Kisses For Me by Brotherhood of Man. The Eurovision Song Contest winner that year, no less. Fascinatingly, for the first three years of the band's existence they were nought but a rotating cast of session singers before coalescing around a definitive line-up in the mid 1970s. Usually this happens the other way around, as with subsequent Eurovision winners Bucks Fizz, whose post-split history is littered with lawsuits and a period of two groups performing under the same name, a la UB40.

Mercedes has told us Russell has completed a massive 92 laps, largely on Pirelli's hardest C1 compound.

We didn't enquire about laptimes because there is no point. Cannot repeat that enough.

No such problems for George Russell and Mercedes, who have once again been reliably racking up the mileage.

McLaren joined the party fairly late, so Lando Norris has only done a number of installation laps.

As we head to the lunch break, Hulkenberg and Audi still haven't made it out after stopping out on track after just a handful of laps this morning in the R26.

The team says it is still investigating the full nature of its "technical issue".

Mercedes front wing

One of the things that has caught our eye from the videos and photography that has been distributed is Mercedes' seemingly unique front wing design. 

Gianluca D'Alessandro has more on what appears to be a completely different interpretation of the new rules on active aerodynamics.

This "test" is also a shakedown for the FIA and its systems. The FIA just distributed its first official event document of 2026 to all officials, teams and media, which is really just a blank sheet signed by race director Rui Marques labelled "TEST".

The McLaren MCL40 in all* its glory.

Well, the testing livery. The real thing follows in Bahrain.