It was a damp start to Day 3 of testing in Jerez. Rosberg was first on track at 9am sharp. He initially set the benchmark of 1:33.0 in the wet conditions ahead of Ricciardo’s RB11.
Red Bull had a troubled morning, completing just 5 laps. An unscheduled engine change was required – an inconvenient setback for the second day in a row. Their best time of the morning was 1:34.7.
Massa takes over the Williams FW37 for the last 2 days of the test and made a near perfect launch on his first attempt in typical Massa fashion.
At 09:27 Nasr span the Sauber C34 at turn 9 which brought out the first red flag of the day. The mishap interrupted the Swiss team’s proceedings but got a good amount of running done in the morning nonetheless.
Despite just 12 laps of running on days 1 & 2 for McLaren, the team with Alonso at the helm clocked 32 laps before lengthy work was done on the engine at mid-day.
Rosberg completed an astonishing 93 laps with 4 hours left in the session and was down to a 1:24.7 as the track conditions improved, the W06 running like clockwork around the Spanish circuit. So when the second red flag of the day came out, everyone was surprised to see Nico stopped on circuit. An electrical-related engine issue at fault.
After a positive first couple of days for Vettel, 2007 champion Kimi Raikkonen took the wheel of the Ferrari. He, like Sebastian, was setting the benchmark times when the track dried out. The Finn demoted Rosberg off top spot with a 1:24.0 before Nasr shaved his time.
Lotus had yet another delayed start, with Maldonado joining the fun at 1pm. The Lotus quickly jumped McLaren and Red Bull’s lap tally and the E23 was running smoothly around Jerez.
Carloz Sainz Jr and Toro Rosso were running well. The STR10 was closing in on the W06’s lap count with race stint simulations.
It turned out that McLaren had a water cooling pressure problem and the team announced that their days running was over. They’ll go into the final day with just 44 laps of running.
Whilst McLaren were having problems, Mercedes had fixed theirs and Nico stormed to the top of the timesheets on the very next lap. 1:22.8 on medium tyres. Nasr promptly beat that by 0.06s on the soft tyres.
Ricciardo’s engine had also been replaced and was able to resume driving with 3 hours left of the session. He set a 1:22.3 before, yet again, Felipe Nasr surfaced to the top with a 1:21.5 on soft tyres.
A fairly quiet last few hours to the session with teams lapping off the pace in the 24-26’s practicing race stints.
Pastor Maldonado was lapping quickly before stopping the car on track and causing a red flag with a minute to go of the day. Felipe Nasr tops the time sheets at the end of day 3 with Nico Rosberg topping the lap tally, and bringing his own Jerez count to over 300 laps.
| Pos | Driver | Team | Time | Laps |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | F. Nasr | Sauber | 1:21.545 | 108 |
| 2 | K. Räikkönen | Ferrari | 1:21.750 | 92 |
| 3 | N. Rosberg | Mercedes | 1:21.982 | 151 |
| 4 | F. Massa | Williams | 1:22.276 | 71 |
| 5 | P. Maldonado | Lotus | 1:22.713 | 97 |
| 6 | C. Sainz | Toro Rosso | 1:23.187 | 136 |
| 7 | D. Ricciardo | Red Bull | 1:23.901 | 48 |
| 8 | F. Alonso | McLaren | 1:35.553 | 32 |
Image courtesy of Sauber F1 Team.
