Felipe Massa set the fastest time on the first day of the final pre-season test in Barcelona on the soft tyre completing a qualifying simulation.

Massa’s time of 1:23.500 is the fastest time seen so far in Barcelona. His time was 0.776s faster than second fastest of the day, Marcus Ericsson in the Sauber who achieved a 1:24.276 on Pirelli’s red supersoft compound tyre. Ericssson also completed the most laps of the day clocking up 122 laps.

Third fastest for the day was Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton. Hamilton set the pace in the morning session on a set of white medium tyres and kept the top spots until the afternoon. His day, however, came to an early end after an MGU-K failure on the Mercedes. The team could not fix the problem before the end of the day. Hamilton is hoping to complete 122 laps tomorrow.

Daniil Kvyat for Red Bull and Romain Grosjean for Lotus finished 4th and 5th fastest respectively. Both completing 75 laps on the day while Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen ended the day in 6th place. Ferrari are expecting new parts on the car on Friday which they hope should improve their pace.

Carlos Sainz Jr. finished the day 7th fastest for Toro Rosso sporting a new nose design. He completed 86 laps on the day.

McLaren endured another difficult day. Jenson Button managed to complete just 7 laps for the day and was almost 8 seconds off Massa’s pace. “After just seven laps, Jenson noted a vibration and brought the car back to the pits, where we discovered a hydraulic leak that required a full power-unit change,” said the team spokesperson. “The time required to complete the change unfortunately meant that our running for the day was over before lunchtime.”

Force India plan to run the VJM08 for the first time this season tomorrow with Nico Hulkenberg at the wheel. They’re expected to be wheels rolling by the afternoon.

Below are the unofficial times for the first day of the final test: