“There is everything to play for still. We won’t know until the first
race but don’t be surprised if we get to the first race and we are not at
the front. We are going in the right direction, though.”
Hamilton completed 117 laps in Barcelona, with three of them in the one minute
20 seconds bracket, faster than anybody else.
Lap times in testing can be a notoriously poor indicator of how the car will
fare in the first race, however, as fuel loads are not disclosed.
Red
Bull’s Mark Webber, referring to how well Mercedes started last
season before tailing off dramatically, said of Hamilton’s performance: “It
was a good time, yeah. But Mercedes have done that a few times in the
winter.”