F1 Pre-Season Testing: Norris edges Gasly on first day of Test 2

His McLaren MCL34 may have ended the day on the back of a low-loader truck, but Lando Norris still managed to claim the fastest time on Tuesday as the second week of pre-season testing got underway in Spain.

With two-time champion Fernando Alonso watching on from the McLaren pits after deciding to pay a flying visit to the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, Norris set a 1m 17.709s before he was forced to pull his car off to the side of the track for a second time, having already stopped during the morning session with a hydraulics issue.

But as the running ended on Tuesday, Norris headed the Red Bull of Pierre Gasly by a slim 0.006s – the Frenchman setting Red Bull’s fastest time of the test so far – with Lance Stroll in third for Racing Point.

The day also witnessed the first blip in pre-season testing for the Mercedes team, after an oil pressure issue for Valtteri Bottas saw him stuck in the garage for nearly the entirety of the afternoon, Mercedes eventually electing to give their W10 a whole new power unit. Things weren’t super smooth over in the Ferrari camp either, with Charles Leclerc’s SF90 needing to be kept in the garage for a lengthy spell in the morning as the team investigated a cooling issue on the car, before Sebastian Vettel enjoyed some issue-free lapping in the afternoon, ending up fourth.

It was a productive day for last week’s late-comers Williams, meanwhile, with George Russell racking up 119 laps in the FW42 – more than the team managed over their two days of running in Week 1. Russell ended his day in P9, his best lap a 1m 19.662s.

Nico Hulkenberg’s lap at the end of last week’s running, a 1m 17.393s, remains the fastest time we’ve seen so far in Barcelona then. But will the times start to tumble when the teams really start to turn the engines up over the next few days? Stay tuned to F1 pre-season testing to find out…