Miki Monras tops day one of Barcelona Formula 2 test

The 19-year-old Spaniard, who was fourth in this year's championship, set the morning pace in 1m35.950s, which remained the benchmark for the rest of the day and was 0.142s quicker than another series regular, Mihai Marinescu.

"I really enjoyed the test day," said Monras. "I expected to be quick as it's my home circuit which I know well and managed to put in some good lap times using new tyres early on.

"I'm happy with my pace and we're looking at F2 as an option for next year but we'll have to see if we can get the budget together."

Third fastest overall was 2011 series runner-up Christopher Zanella, who set his best time in the afternoon, when drivers were allowed to use the overboost feature.

The best of the rookies was GP3 midfielder Vittorio Ghirelli in fourth, while German F3 graduate Markus Pommer and Maxime Jousse, brother of Le Mans Series LMP1 champion Julien Jousse, completed the top six.

European F3 Open champion Alex Fontana was seventh, ahead of British Formula Ford title-winner and McLaren AUTOSPORT BRDC Award finalist Scott Malvern, Edoardo Liberati and Kelvin Snoeks.

Pos  Driver                Time       Gap
 1.  Miki Monras           1m35.950s
 2.  Mihai Marinescu       1m36.092s  + 0.142s
 3.  Christopher Zanella   1m36.533s  + 0.587s
 4.  Vittorio Ghirelli     1m36.723s  + 0.773s
 5.  Markus Pommer         1m36.874s  + 0.924s
 6.  Maxime Jousse         1m37.292s  + 1.324s
 7.  Alex Fontana          1m37.439s  + 1.489s
 8.  Scott Malvern         1m37.641s  + 1.691s
 9.  Edoardo Liberati      1m37.656s  + 1.706s
10.  Kelvin Snoeks         1m37.685s  + 1.735s
11.  Hector Hurst          1m37.710s  + 1.760s
12.  Riccardo Brutschin    1m37.932s  + 1.982s
13.  Daniel McKenzie       1m38.726s  + 2.774s
14.  Aaron Steele          1m39.320s  + 3.370s
15.  Sasha Radola          1m39.406s  + 3.456s
16.  Mauro Calamia         1m39.448s  + 3.498s
17.  Sandro Zeller         1m40.389s  + 4.839s
18.  Alex Craven           1m43.393s  + 7.443s