McLaren Formula 1 junior Nyck de Vries was fastest on the opening day of testing in Bahrain ahead of the 2018 Formula 2 season.
De Vries set a 1m43.785s in the afternoon to put Prema back on top of the timesheets. Louis Deletraz was second quickest for series newcomers Charouz Racing System.
Deletraz’s best effort was 0.170s adrift of de Vries’ benchmark.
Fellow returnee Luca Ghiotto topped the morning, his 1m44.042s left him third at the end of the day ahead of Lando Norris, who topped two of the three days of the first pre-season test at Paul Ricard.
Arjun Maini was fifth fastest, with Deletraz’s team-mate Antonio Fuoco completing the top six, the Ferrari junior switches from Prema to Charouz for 2018.
GP3 race winner Ralph Boschung was seventh for MP Motorsport, with Maximilian Gunther eighth and former Red Bull junior Sergio Sette Camara in ninth position.
ART Grand Prix duo Jack Aitken and George Russell were 10th and 11th on the timesheets ahead of the Russian Time pairing of Tadasuke Makino and series veteran Artem Markelov.
Sean Gelael was 14th for Prema ahead of Honda junior Nirei Fukuzumi and former Formula 1 driver Roberto Merhi.
Nicholas Latifi, who returned to the cockpit for the first time after suffering from illness, was slowest of all the runners in 20th.
The test will conclude on Friday, with the first race of the season also held in the same location on April 7.
