The second day of pre-season testing ahead of the 2024 Formula 1 season brought with a few surprises.
Although pre-season testing should always be taken with a pinch of salt there is no denying that teams who perform especially well here are normally well set, at least for the opening few rounds of the season.
This bodes well for Ferrari then who not only topped the final standings with Carlos Sainz but also showed a promising race pace in the long runs. In fact, the race simulation lap times were rather more than a bit promising. Data reveals that the SF24, this year’s Ferrari, lapping nearly one and a half seconds quicker that the 2023 car. And to ad to Ferrari’s seeming upswing the analysis also showed a race pace nearly six tenths quicker last year’s race pace, set then by Max Verstappen.
Charles Leclerc too has said that the 2024 Ferrari appears to be an all-round more compliant car. “We’re making good progress,” he said. “Once again the car is doing what it needs to do, which wasn’t the case at the start of last year. “I remember after the first few days, I was much more worried because it was a very, very complicated car to drive. This year it’s easier, so it’s starting from a better base, but there’s still a lot of work to do.
“For the time being, everything’s going according to plan, in the sense that we haven’t had any unpleasant surprises in terms of the car’s behaviour.”
Williams too had reported that it has solved quite a few of the issues that plagued their progress in 2023. However, they tempered this optimisim by revealing that the 2024 car is not without issues. Alex Albon stated that Williams had hit the ground “jogging” rather than running.
The new Mercedes too looked like it had shaken off its ‘diva’ behaviour as the 2024 car appears to be a lot more consistent and predictable. Checo Perez set the most amount of laps by the end of the day with 129 laps to Lewis Hamilton’s mark of 123 laps. Logan Sargeant, for Williams, also broke the century marker with 117 laps on the board.
