Gary Anderson's F1 testing verdict

After 12 days of pre-season testing and with only a week and a half until the action gets started for real in Melbourne, I've seen nothing to suggest that Mercedes won't go into the Australian Grand Prix weekend set to lock out the front row and dominate the race.

That's a real shame from the fans' perspective, but things do look very similar to last year after Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton topped the final Barcelona test. There is a hint of one potential weakness, though.

What interested me is the fact that both Rosberg and Hamilton complained a little about the balance of the car, and that suggests to me that the W06 Hybrid might be a little more nervous at the rear than last year's car.

When you go on to softer tyres, you pick up rear grip and that usually makes the car understeer. But after a lot of baseline running on mediums, when we did see them go on to the softs (Mercedes didn't use the super-soft Pirellis at all) there didn't seem to be that same balance change. In reality I think the car was better balanced than on the mediums, and the laptime certainly shows that.

Mercedes' drivers haven't been entirely positive about the car © LAT

If the car is a little bit more unstable at the rear and harder on the rear tyres, that is the one glimmer of hope for the chasing pack.

It could mean that the Mercedes drivers lock out the front row but drop back in the race. That might prove to be far too optimistic for the chasing pack because if it all comes up the way that things are looking right now, Mercedes could still have eight tenths of a second on everybody regardless, which would be a concern heading into the season.

Last year wasn't so bad for fans because we were coming off the back of four years of Red Bull dominance, so the change was a good thing even though it was just a different team dominating.

But it's harder to live with the second time around.

We don't really want to see a world championship battle fought out between just Hamilton and Rosberg again. Based on last year we know which way that will go most of the time, just as we did when Red Bull dominated and Sebastian Vettel almost always came out on top.

So unless Mercedes has got a problem with rear tyre use, we could be looking at a similar story to 2014. It's not a surprise, though, since after last year's major rules change everyone is just refining their cars, so unless Mercedes dropped the ball, it was always going to be difficult for the others to catch up.

And it seems that Mercedes has been able to make the best of the introduction of the variable trumpets in the engine. That's a tool that can be used to tune the engine to give you more top-end power while maintaining good mid-range torque, and it's another area where the champion team has done well.

Williams looks like it has held its ground but not gained much © LAT

If that's the case, all credit to Mercedes. It did the best job last year, continued to develop the car throughout the season and is going to gain the benefit from that.

As for the rest, you would say that there are three in the chasing pack: Williams, Ferrari and Red Bull.

I think we saw what Williams was capable of at Barcelona and its quickest time was still 0.271s off Rosberg's best mark. I can see it being in a similar position to last year, in that second bunch but not able to challenge Mercedes for wins except if something goes wrong.

That's the most important thing for Williams, to ensure it starts the year as it finished the last one. The three times when Mercedes dropped the ball in 2014, Williams wasn't there to pick up the pieces, even though more often than not it ended up as best of the rest.

The worry for Williams is that this is as good as it will get for the team. It's not one of the four works teams, which is always going to be a disadvantage.

It's very difficult to say where Red Bull will end up because I don't think we've seen the full potential of the car. But you write that team off at your peril and I would expect it to be in the ballpark.

The most encouraging performances in testing have come from Ferrari. I would not expect it to be winning lots of races, but it will certainly be closer after all of those winter changes.

Ferrari's optimism seems justified © XPB

It will be interesting to see where these three teams end up in qualifying for the Australian GP, both in terms of the gap to Mercedes and how they stack up against each other.

Behind them, I can see another battle developing between Lotus and McLaren-Honda. Lotus looked OK in testing and the car is definitely a step forward on last year, not that this is saying much.

McLaren might start off further behind, but it's difficult to get a read on where that package is really at in terms of pace.

You would always want to try to explore the real potential of the car in testing, and the fastest time in the final Barcelona test was 2.433s off the pace. If that gap is the same in qualifying in Melbourne, it will be exceptionally bad.

But you don't always get representative times at Barcelona. A switch to softer tyres can give you an artificial performance boost for one lap, particularly in the long Turn 3 where if your car doesn't work you will lose a lot of time.

So it can be misleading. It could even be that McLaren is struggling more than that. But, that said, I would expect it to improve as the season goes on.

The key is to achieve reliability, and it's still not clear how much of the problems are on the Honda side and how much on the team side. All we do know is that there is a lot of work to be done.

This means McLaren could start the season in what I would expect to be the group at the back - well, at the back when you ignore Manor, which will be off the rear of the field if it makes it to Australia.

That group would contain Toro Rosso, Sauber and Force India.

Toro Rosso's major update for the final test was a statement of intent © XPB

We saw a big aerodynamic package introduced by Toro Rosso at Barcelona, which is a sign that Red Bull is serious about its second team challenging for the top five in the constructors' championship.

As for Sauber, as well as a change of colours, it does seem that it has improved in other areas too. It has new drivers who look to be doing a decent job, and given where Sauber was last season, I think that this is about as good as can be expected.

When you come off such a bad season, it's important to try to regain some stability, and Sauber looks to be in much better shape.

As for Force India, a team I know very well, it's always difficult to go into a season underprepared and it has not had its new car on track for two thirds of testing.

But, that said, hats off to everyone there for producing a car that ran relatively reliably in the final test. While it will be behind where it should be in Melbourne, with the drivers Force India has there's every chance of being able to make the finish and score some valuable points.

Without the winter problems, you would say that Force India should have been on course for its best season. But even with the delay, the car looks like a decent enough progression from last year.

Force India also did exactly the right thing at Barcelona, focusing on a sensible programme rather than trying to wring its neck and worry about laptimes.

The key is to understand the car. Given the limitations of two and a half days of pre-season testing, the team has done about as much as could be expected.

That's how things look to be stacking up right now, but there will be more upgrades for Australia. And with engine development allowed as the season goes on, there will be changes to the power unit packages too.

But for the time being, I can't find any way to look past Hamilton for the drivers' championship and Mercedes for the constructors' title.