Bottas fastest in the morning of the final day of Winter testing in Bahrain as Red Bull's troubles continue

(Williams F1 Team via Twitter)

 

The Williams F1 Team continued to show that their new car has great pace as Valtteri Bottas topped the timesheets on the final morning of pre-season testing at the Bahrain International Circuit. The Finn set the fastest time of 1m 34.797s in the FW36 which has proven to be an extremely reliable car.

 

Ferrari's Fernando Alonso was second for the Italian team as he wraps up the team's winter test programme. The Spaniard set a time of 1m 35.507s. The general feeling in the F1 paddock is that Ferrari are yet to show the true potential of their new car.

 

Nico Hulkenberg once again showed the Force India like Williams have a good car under them as the German finished the morning session in third place. Toro Rosso's Jean Eric Vergne was the quickest Renault powered car as the Frenchman who took over from team mate Daniil Kvyat was fourth fastest.

 

Following a difficult day for the Sauber F1 Team yesterday the Swiss outfit recalled Adrian Sutil for the final day of Winter testing and the German was 6th fastest in the C33.

 

Jenson Button was back in the MP4-29 for McLaren today and was 7th fastest albeit 3.3 seconds behind Valtteri Bottas. The Woking based outfit have shown some great pace over the course of the winter testing programme.

 

Following an extremely impressive run of laps yesterday Caterham continued to progress this morning as Kamui Kobayashi was 8th fastest finishing the session ahead of the Lotus F1 Team's Romain Grosjean and reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel.

 

The Milton Keynes based squad started the morning well as the German completed 44 laps before smoke was seen coming out of the back of the RB10 he also spun.

 

Max Chilton is the only other driver to have set a time so far this morning for the Marussia F1 Team as Mercedes AMG F1's Lewis Hamilton on went out on track for the first time at 09.40 (Irish time) after the team discovered a problem with W05.

 

In other F1 news, the Bahrain circuit officials have confirmed that they have named Turn 1 in honour of Michael Schumacher.

 

©Ben Johnston 2014