Guanyu Zhou Tops Second Day Of 2023 F1 Test

Alfa Romeo’s Guanyu Zhou topped the second day of 2023 F1 Pre-Season Testing in Bahrain. 

Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz dominated the morning session ahead of Williams’ rookie, Logan Sargeant and Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso, with Zhou fourth fastest.

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen meanwhile dominated the afternoon session until Zhou unexpectedly opted for a low-fuel flier, which saw him go fastest with just 30 minutes of the day left with 1m 31.610 on the softest tyre compound available.

Zhou consequently finished fastest overall ahead of Verstappen and Alonso heading into the final day of testing.

 

Morning Session

Alonso was first out on track but it was Haas’ Kevin Magnussen who emerged the quickest driver with 1m 33.710 in the opening hour, ahead of Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon.

Sainz though went fastest with 1m 32.653 in the 62nd minute before he eventually lowered the benchmark lap time on the C3 tyre by 0.167 seconds in the 89th minute, which went unbeaten across the remainder of the morning session.

Alonso meanwhile went second quickest during the second hour as drivers focused largely on long runs and race simulations, whilst Williams’ Logan Sargeant left it late on the C5 tyre to slot into second fastest with just under 20 minutes left on the clock.

The session concluded with a race start procedure practice which initially was aborted before the actual race start backfired, with only Magnussen enjoying a clean start whilst others stalled which led Sainz to nearly run into the back of McLaren’s Lando Norris which led to a red flag to conclude the session.

Sainz, Sargeant and Alonso consequently rounded out the top three in the morning session, ahead of; Guanyu Zhou, Magnussen, Ocon, Perez, Hamilton, Norris and Yuki Tsunoda.

 

Afternoon Session

During the lunch break, seven teams switched drivers except for Alfa Romeo, Aston Martin and Williams who all opted to continue running Zhou, Alonso and Sargeant in the afternoon session respectively – of which Zhou was first out on track.

Verstappen though was quickily on the pace as he went third then second on his first two flying laps before he went fastest in the 29th minute with 1m 31.863 on the C3 tyres.

The afternoon’s proceedings otherwise ran largely quietly with teams mainly focused on race simulations, as Verstappen eventually lowered his benchmark time to 1m 31.650 in the 56th minute, which went unbeaten for much of the session.

Mercedes’ George Russell meanwhile caused the day’s only technical related red flag after he stopped out of Turn 10 with a hydraulic failure just over two-and-a-half hours after the session began, which ultimately saw him miss the remainder of the session.

Proceedings resumed 21 minutes later with AlphaTauri’s Nyck De Vries briefly going second, having opted to try out the C5 tyre – which is the softest tyre compound available – but was eventually bettered by Alonso.

Zhou meanwhile opted to wait until the last 35 minutes of running before he also stuck on the C5 tyre for a low fuel run, which saw him go fastest with 1m 31.610 to claim top spot.

Verstappen, Alonso, De Vries, Nico Hulkenberg, Sainz, Sargeant, Charles Leclerc, Oscar Piastri and Pierre Gasly eventually rounded out the top ten runners across both sessions, albeit behind Zhou who was fastest overall.

After the chaotic race start practice procedure of the morning session, stewards decided to conduct another practice race start in the closing minutes with the initial start again aborted, with the second start this time going much cleaner except for a slow-starting Verstappen.

Position	Driver	Team	Time
1	Guanyu Zhou	Alfa Romeo	1m 31.610
2	Max Verstappen	Red Bull	+ 0.040
3	Fernando Alonso	Aston Martin	+ 0.595
4	Nyck De Vries	AlphaTauri	+ 0.612
5	Nico Hulkenberg	Haas	+ 0.856
6	Carlos Sainz	Ferrari	+ 0.876
7	Logan Sargeant	Williams	+ 0.939
8	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	+ 1.115
9	Oscar Piastri	McLaren	+ 1.565
10	Pierre Gasly	Alpine	+ 1.576
11	Kevin Magnussen	Haas	+ 1.832
12	Esteban Ocon	Alpine	+ 1.880
13	George Russell	Mercedes	+ 2.044
14	Sergio Perez	Red Bull	+ 2.141
15	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	+ 2.344
16	Lando Norris	McLaren	+ 3.912
17	Yuki Tsunoda	AlphaTauri	+ 4.098