Leclerc leads Albon as F1’s 2022 Bahrain test begins

Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc was half a second clear on the opening morning of Formula 1’s second 2022 pre-season test in Bahrain.

Leclerc put his Ferrari to the top of the timesheets just before the midway mark in the session with a 1m34.531s on the C3 tyres.

This put Leclerc over 1.5 seconds clear until the Williams of Alex Albon jumped into second place and eventually cut that gap to 0.539s on the C4 tyres.

The top three was completed by Aston Martin’s four-time champion Sebastian Vettel who was 1.175s slower than Leclerc’s benchmark.

Red Bull’s Sergio Perez completed more laps than any other driver and was fourth quickest ahead of Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton.

Alpine was able to fix the DRS issue that plagued its opening test. Esteban Ocon was sixth fastest ahead of 2022’s sole rookie Zhou Guanyu (Alfa Romeo) who stopped in the pitlane and had to be pushed back to his garage.

McLaren’s Lando Norris completed just 21 laps during the morning session with what appeared to be an issue with his brakes.

Pierre Gasly was the slowest of the nine drivers to set a time, with a lap that left him 3.357s off Leclerc’s time.

The Haas F1 team watched the morning session from the garage after cargo delays ensured it wouldn’t be ready to run until this afternoon. The team has requested to run its 2022 car on Sunday to compensate.

Day one times
1. Leclerc (Ferrari) 1m34.531s, C3, 64 laps
2. Albon (Williams) 1m35.070s, C4, 53 laps
3. Vettel (Aston Martin), 1m35.706s, C3, 38 laps
4. Perez (Red Bull) 1m35.977s, C3, 70 laps
5. Hamilton (Mercedes) 1m36.365s, C3, 62 laps
6. Ocon (Alpine) 1m36.768s, C2, 42 laps
7. Zhou (Alfa Romeo) 1m37.164s, C3, 54 laps
8. Norris (McLaren) 1m37.580s, C4, 21 laps
9. Gasly (AlphaTauri) 1m37.888s, C2, 44 laps