Max Verstappen completes day one whitewash as Alonso turns heads

Max Verstappen, Red Bull, RB19, Testing — Photo: © LAT Images

Formula 1

Verstappen completes day one whitewash as Alonso turns heads

Verstappen was fastest in both sessions

Ewan Gale

Thursday 23 February 2023 17:32 Updated: 10:18

Max Verstappen completed a whitewash on day one of F1 pre-season testing in Bahrain.

The Dutchman was fastest in the opening session of the day and went faster in the second to underline Red Bull's intentions ahead of the new season.

Red Bull's strong start was underlined by the only issue of note being a rear jack failure during a practice pit stop in the final hour of the day.

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Another relatively smooth session ran uninterrupted for the entirety of the four hours and 15 minutes.

As is normal for the beginning of an afternoon test session, there was no rush to hit the track with teams still making tweaks between drivers - if swaps were made at lunch - or just taking the chance to switch set-ups.

Verstappen was the first car to hit the track 13 minutes into the session and his form from the morning continued.

The two-time champion pushed into the one minute, 32secs mark while surpassing a tonne of laps, ending the day on 157 laps.

Alonso dazzles and Norris bounces back from slow start

Fernando Alonso was in fine form in his first session of the season, finishing just 0.029s adrift of Verstappen after taking over from Felipe Drugovich.

Charles Leclerc tagged in for Carlos Sainz, who had completed the first session for Ferrari, and finished on an almost identical time as his team-mate to end fourth for the day.

The Monégasque endured a ragged start to the session but regrouped with no damage caused.

Lando Norris stepped in for Oscar Piastri but his session got off to a troublesome start.

The Briton only completed five laps in the opening two hours with McLaren forced to create a temporary fix to an issue around the cake tins and wheel brows at the front of the MCL60.

When Norris did hit the track, the car looked relatively fast, ending the day fifth on the timesheets with a lap completed under the lights.

Lewis Hamilton finished the day sixth fastest after completing Mercedes' afternoon running, with no porpoising reported by the Brackley-based outfit.

Rookie report

Williams rookie Logan Sargeant was the next of the afternoon runners in the standings, finishing 10th, with Valtteri Bottas 12th for Alfa Romeo.

Nyck de Vries came next in 13th, with Esteban Ocon down in 17th for Alpine. The French manufacturer was forced to tape up the wing mirror supports for Ocon for the entirety of the session.

Haas' Kevin Magnussen was slowest for the day, though as ever with testing all times are unrepresentative with fuel loads, engine modes and set-ups all unknown, as well as the presence of Pirelli prototype tyres.