Hamilton upbeat despite testing crash

The British driver had completed the most laps of any driver on Tuesday when he was pitched into the barriers, badly damaging the front end of the new car and bringing his session to an early end.

But in spite of the setback, Hamilton could see only positives.

“For me it's an incredibly positive start to be the first car out on track and completing a good number of laps,” he said.

“Other teams have been going out for single-lap runs, starting a few hours after we had first hit the track, so to have started running through our test programme was very encouraging. The car feels quite good, especially considering it's so early in our programme, so overall it's been a positive day.

“Of course, it's unfortunate to end the day early when everyone has worked so hard and we had looked like easily completing the most mileage of anyone here today, but we'll make that track time back and it's better to have these things happen now than in Melbourne. I'm really proud of the team for what they've achieved in getting us here and we'll keep pushing.”

Mercedes' technical director Paddy Lowe echoed Hamilton’s optimism after the new cars maiden run.

“We were the first team to send a car out on track, on the dot at 0900 this morning, and were gradually extending the length of the runs when the incident occurred,” he said.

“Lewis' initial feedback was positive once he was able to complete some timed laps, which is a promising indicator for the basic package. Concerning the failure itself, we are still analysing its cause, and this process, coupled with the repairs to the car, have brought an end to our running today.

“The teams at Brackley and Brixworth did a fantastic job to prepare the car for running this morning and tomorrow we hope to start adding to what is already a useful number of laps completed. There is a lot of data for us to analyse overnight and the learning curve this winter will be very steep.”

Testing continues in Spain on Wednesday.