F1 2025 pre-season testing – Day 2: Sainz fastest but McLaren is still to show pace

F1

Carlos Sainz is fastest on the second day of F1 pre-season testing but McLaren's pace looks ominous

Williams of Carlos Sainz on track in 2025 f1 preseason testing

Sainz was fastest on Day 2 of testing

Clive Rose/Getty Images

Teams upped the pace in the second day of 2025 F1 pre-season testing in Bahrain, with lap times tumbling as they started race simulations ahead of the final sessions tomorrow.

There were more spins and minor-offs too as softer tyres were fitted and drivers started to push the limits further.

Lewis Hamilton set the early pace at the start of the day, finishing the first session fastest, more than a second quicker than Wednesday’s fastest lap. Carlos Sainz then took the top spot in the afternoon, ahead of both Ferraris and then the two Mercedes drivers.

But while McLaren was at the bottom end of the timings, its car looked just as rapid, if not more, than the frontrunners; Lando Norris offered a hint of the car’s true potential with a set of blistering-looking laps which were abandoned so that his crew could practice pitstops. Earlier, his race pace looked formidable.

The reigning constructors’ champions didn’t appear to be having the smoothest day after Oscar Piastri had a small bump with Nico Hülkenberg in the morning, and Lando Norris had a slow start to the afternoon session, but the team had a better run than Red Bull, which cost the team more than an hour of morning running.

Mercedes was prolific: George Russell the only driver to exceed a race distance in the morning, with Kimi Antonelli on course for the same in the afternoon.

Haas F1 car of Esteban Ocon with intermediate tyres in 2025 preseason testing

One of just two teams with wet tyres, Haas sent Esteban Ocon out on intermediates

Clive Mason/Getty Images

F1 arrived in Bahrain with the expectation of three days of uninterrupted sun-kissed running in 2025 pre-season testing.

But after a power cut and drizzle for the opening day on Wednesday, Thursday morning brought more clouds, and enough rain that Haas sent Esteban Ocon out on intermediate tyres around an hour and a half into the session.

The team is just one of two — along with Aston Martin — to have selected wet weather rubber from their permitted allocation of 35 tyre sets from Pirelli; the forecast ahead of testing showed a 0% chance of rain.

A washout was avoided as the shower quickly stopped, but clouds still loom over the Sakhir circuit.

Racing Bulls F1 car of Yuki Tsunoda with aero rake in 2025 preseason testing

Racing Bulls fitted an enormous aero rake to Yuki Tsunoda’s Racing Bull at the start of Day 2

Mark Sutton/F1 via Getty Images

F1 2025 pre-season testing Day 2 – morning session

Today saw the final testing appearances for Carlos Sainz and Liam Lawson, who were in their Williams and Red Bull cars all day before their team-mates drive throughout the final day. The other teams continued to rotate their drivers between the morning and afternoon sessions.

Before the rain arrived, Lewis Hamilton hit the top of the time-sheet where he would remain all morning. He, along with many others, continued to assess their cars’ aerodynamic performance with aero rakes.

The Ferrari was fitted with antler-like appendages on the front wing that appeared to be measuring air pressure just ahead of the car. The run was witnessed by Ferrari chairman John Elkann, who flew in to watch the team’s new superstar driver from the pit garage.

Alpine, McLaren, Haas and Racing Bulls also fitted aero rakes for a second day, as work to correlate their cars’ real-world aerodynamics with those predicted in simulations continued.

John Elkann talks to Fred Vasseur in Ferrari pit garage at 2025 F1 preseason testing

John Elkann with team principal Fred Vasseur

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Aero rake on McLaren F1 car during 2025 F1 preseason testing

Oscar Piastri gathers more aero data for McLaren

Mark Sutton/F1 via Getty Images

Mercedes appeared to be focused on maximising its mileage at the start of the day, and George Russell racked up 71 laps during the session.

Red Bull could only dream of such distance after Liam Lawson headed for the pits an hour before the end of the session with only 28 laps under his belt. The team later confirmed an engine water pressure issue and was focused on repairing the power unit for the afternoon.

Half an hour later, Oscar Piastri and Nico Hülkenberg were also headed to their garages after coming together as Piastri lunged up the inside of the Sauber driver, who had left space, then ran wide and knocked Hülkenberg’s rear wheel with his front wing. There didn’t appear to be any lasting damage.

Nico Hulkenberg in Sauber pit garage during 2025 F1 preseason testing

A bump with Piastri interrupted Hülkenberg’s running

Bryn Lennon/F1 via Getty Images

By this time, Hamilton had set his fastest time of the morning: a 1min 29.379sec lap on the medium-compound C3 tyre, which was over a second faster than Lando Norris’s time-sheet-topping effort yesterday. It’s also quicker than last year’s best time of 1min 29.921sec set by his Ferrari predecessor Carlos Sainz.

But Sainz wasn’t quite overshadowed: his 1min 30.090sec effort using the harder C2 compound made him third fastest on the morning, behind George Russell.

 

F1 2025 pre-season testing Day 2 morning session times

Position Driver Team Time Laps
1 Lewis Hamilton Ferrari 1min 29.379sec 45
2 George Russell Mercedes 1min 29.778sec 71
3 Carlos Sainz Williams 1min 30.090sec 44
4 Pierre Gasly Alpine 1min 30.430sec 40
5 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin 1min 30.700sec 45
6 Yuki Tsunoda Racing Bulls 1min 30.793sec 46
7 Oscar Piastri McLaren 1min 30.821sec 44
8 Liam Lawson Red Bull 1min 31.233sec 28
9 Nico Hülkenberg Sauber 1min 31.457sec 56
10 Esteban Ocon Haas 1min 33.071sec 69

 

F1 2025 pre-season testing Day 2 – afternoon session

Lando Norris was late out of the garage in the afternoon after having a new floor fitted to the car. and managed only eight laps in the first 90 minutes of the session. It didn’t look too encouraging that McLaren (like Red Bull) continued to assess their cars’ aerodynamic performance into the afternoon with flo-vis paint when others had moved on, but the end of the day finished on a high.

Norris managed to complete 77 laps in total — well beyond race distance of 57 laps. He had mentioned that the car needed rear-end stability but his long-run pace was up with the frontrunners and he set a purple middle sector  — the fastest of the day — in one of the partial laps that he abandoned for several pitstop practices.

Meanwhile Sainz carried on his final testing programme with what looked like a qualifying simulation which bagged him the best time of the day so far, followed by a series of long runs that eventually saw him cover 127 laps over the full day, the only driver to break into three figures.

Blurred image of Lando Norris McLaren in 2025 F1 preseason testing

Norris looked to be flying, but didn’t set a representative lap time

Bryn Lennon/Getty Images

More spots of rain fell early in the afternoon, as they had done in the morning, but the threat of larger showers never materialised. Running continued and on the slipperier track, at higher speeds, drivers found the limit: Kimi Antonelli, Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc were among the spinners, while Jack Doohan also went off.

Antonelli finished the afternoon with one-hundredth of a second of Mercedes team-mate George Russell and with 87 laps under his belt.

Little split the Ferraris either: Leclerc’s fastest lap was less than half-a-tenth slower than Hamilton’s. Although unknown tyre conditions, fuel loads and team instructions mean that we don’t have the context to compare the times, the results will only add to the anticipation of watching these team rivalries play out.

Haas’s slow and steady progress through testing was interrupted in the afternoon, with floor work needed on Oliver Bearman’s car, but he still managed more than a race distance.

At the end of the day, Sainz remained on top, as he had been a year previously when he set not just the fastest lap of Day 2 in his Ferrari, but what would be the quickest of last year’s pre-season testing.

Position Driver Team Time Laps
1 Carlos Sainz Williams 1min 29.348sec 127
2 Lewis Hamilton Ferrari 1min 29.379sec 45
3 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 1min 29.431sec 83
4 George Russell Mercedes 1min 29.778sec 71
5 Kimi Antonelli Mercedes 1min 29.784sec 87
6 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 1min 30.229sec 57
7 Liam Lawson Red Bull 1min 30.252sec 91
8 Jack Doohan Alpine 1min 30.368sec 80
9 Pierre Gasly Alpine 1min 30.430sec 40
10 Isack Hadjar Racing Bulls 1min 30.675sec 94
11 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin 1min 30.700sec 45
12 Yuki Tsunoda Racing Bulls 1min 30.793sec 46
13 Oscar Piastri McLaren 1min 30.821sec 44
14 Lando Norris McLaren 1min 30.882sec 77
15 Gabriel Bortoleto Sauber 1min 31.057sec 80
16 Nico Hülkenberg Sauber 1min 31.457sec 56
17 Esteban Ocon Haas 1min 33.071sec 69
18 Oliver Bearman Haas 1min 34.372sec 66