Alfa Romeo’s Zhou Guanyu left it late to end day two of Formula 1 testing in Bahrain on top of the time sheets, while Mercedes were hit with mechanical issues.
Reigning world champion Max Verstappen had led the way for most of the afternoon in his Red Bull before Chinese Zhou bolted on soft tyres in the closing stages and set a time of 1m:31.610s to displace Verstappen by 0.040s.
Fernando Alonso ended the day third in his Aston Martin, logging in an impressive 130 laps to continue his impressive start to testing with his new team.
AlphaTauri’s Nyck de Vries was fourth-fastest, ahead of Haas’ Nico Hulkenberg (fifth) and the Ferrari of Carlos Sainz (sixth). American rookie Logan Sargeant topped the mileage charts with 154 laps as he had a full day of running in the Williams and finished seventh.
Closing out the top 10 were Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc (eighth), McLaren’s Oscar Piastri (ninth) and new Alpine driver Pierre Gasly (10th).
It was a day to forget for Mercedes after a positive first day of testing as George Russell’s car broke.
🏁 DAY 2 CLASSIFICATION 🏁
Big lap numbers on the board for Logan Sargeant, Fernando Alonso and Zhou Guanyu! 💪#F1 #F1Testing pic.twitter.com/nYN7Y6NGmq
— Formula 1 (@F1) February 24, 2023
Russell ground to a halt with an hour and a half remaining on the clock due to an hydraulic failure. It prevent Mercedes from completing any further running on Friday and it meant the team missed the opportunity to gather crucial data about the car when track conditions were at their best. Russell ultimately ended the day in 13th.
Lewis Hamilton also did not have an entirely trouble-free run in the morning after losing some bodywork from his W14 and reported balance issues which placed him in a lowly 15th place on the time sheets.
Pre-season testing concludes on Saturday before the 2023 season commences still at the Bahrain International Circuit next week.
