Formula 1: Vettel stands, Schumacher collects kilometers – Mercedes gets rolling

Every beginning is difficult – this also applies to Sebastian Vettel’s restart at Aston Martin. But he can comfort himself: Even Mercedes needed start-up time for the tests in Bahrain.

The competition swept across the racetrack in Bahrain, collecting kilometers, data and experience for the new Formula 1 season. Sebastian Vettel was sitting at the lunch table at the same time, indulging in a snack, what else should he do: The restart in the Aston Martin is extremely slow for the ex-world champion.

“That was not a day of good news,” said Vettel on Saturday when the “real” lunch break had started. In the morning he actually wanted to get to know his new racing car, but due to transmission problems it was only enough for ten rather slow test laps. And the clock is ticking, two thirds of the tests have already run.

“We don’t have a lot of time,” he said, “hopefully things will go better on Sunday so that we can catch up. We now have to work with what we have.”

And that’s not too much so far. The team, which was called Racing Point until last season, already lost time on Friday due to electronic problems. After all, said Vettel, “the car feels very promising”. It is completely different from the Ferrari he drove until last season, Vettel expressly did not want to make a rating yet.

Vettel: “I still need time”

At the Scuderia, he was obviously unable to cope with the way the car was driven recently. Asking whether the Aston Martin is basically better for him, Vettel repeatedly avoided: “I still need time to get used to the details.” Before the season starts on the weekend of March 28, also in Bahrain, Vettel only has Sunday.

This year Aston Martin wants to confirm the good impressions of the previous season, again for podium places and occasionally even for victories.

Much less is at stake for Mick Schumacher in the Haas backbench team. The rookie really got going for the first time on Saturday, the US racing team had apparently done a good job overnight. On Friday, Schumacher’s hydraulic problems slowed down, on Saturday he and teammate Nikita Masepin completed 164 laps, no other team was on the track for that long.

Mercedes also showed that smooth tests cannot be taken for granted. The works team had by far the least time on the track on Friday due to a gearbox change. Record world champion Lewis Hamilton now did a good 58 laps on Saturday, but there were still problems: The W12 slipped heavily again, landed in the gravel and had to be recovered by crane.

It wasn’t until the afternoon that Valtteri Bottas completed the first really enjoyable session for the defending champions: The Finn was fastest of the day and achieved a respectable 57 laps.

Formula 1: Results of the second test day