Sergio Perez achieved the fastest lap time as Red Bull set the pace in Bahrain on the final day of Formula 1 pre-season testing ahead of the 2023 season.
Perez traded times with Lewis Hamilton late in the day, with the Mexican’s best effort of a 1:30.305 on the C4 compound enough for him to prevail by 0.3s over the lead Mercedes driver.
Charles Leclerc had led the morning session and his previous benchmark time kept him marginally ahead of Ferrari team-mate Carlos Sainz, as both remained inside the top five.
READ MORE: F1 2023 Pre-season testing – Day 3 Results
The Ferrari duo were beaten by an impressive lap from Valtteri Bottas in the Alfa Romeo, recovering from his earlier stoppage to wound up third.
Yuki Tsunoda and Kevin Magnussen also took advantage of the cooler track conditions and grippier rubber to post quick enough times to be classified sixth and seventh respectively.
The top 10 was completed by George Russell and the Aston Martin pair of Fernando Alonso and Felipe Drugovich, continuing to stand in for the injured Lance Stroll.
With only one session left for the teams to learn about its respective packages before the beginning of the season, several cars appeared on the track early in the session once the green light appeared at the end of the pit lane.
Among that group included the Alpine of Esteban Ocon and the McLaren of Lando Norris – perhaps unsurprising with those two teams possessing the least mileage of any side in testing to that point.
As the teams worked through its respective plans with a predominant focus on completing race runs on the harder compounds, Ferrari became the first team to bolt on the softer rubber.
Sainz, fitted with the C4 tyre, fell 0.138s short of Leclerc on his first foray before his second push lap brought him even closer to his team-mate – leaving him only 0.012s shy.
As darkness began to descend on the circuit, the commencement of more performance runs began, resulting in a flurry of changes to the timing order late in the day.
Hamilton ventured out on the grippiest C5 compound and the Brit immediately managed to eclipse what Leclerc had managed earlier on by two-tenths.
However, his time leading the charts remained brief as Perez, on the slightly harder C4 configuration, soon went even quicker than the Mercedes.
Although Hamilton would snatch it back momentarily, Perez stole it back once more the next time around. The Red Bull driver eventually extended his advantage to end proceedings nearly four-tenths clear of anybody else.
Despite being pipped, competing for top honours on the performance-orientated runs marked a much better day for the Mercedes outfit, following a troublesome Friday.
Although Hamilton appeared more content with the W14, the seven-time champion continued to notably struggle on traction during the long runs, suggesting the German outfit still has a slight handling imbalance to cure ahead of next weekend’s race.
With no stoppages past the lunch break – apart from the scheduled Virtual Safety Car and red flag procedural tests in the dying embers – Alfa Romeo was able to recover the mileage lost from the suspected engine failure Bottas suffered towards the end of the morning.
The Finn returned early in the afternoon to clock over 100 laps of running – a feat that every team on the grid managed, except for McLaren.
The Woking-based entity had been hampered by problems in the morning, which continued into the afternoon as Norris managed only 37 laps in the session.
Aside from being the pace-setting team in three of the six sessions, Red Bull’s faultless reliability record remained intact to enable Perez to also surpass the century marks for laps completed.
So, pre-season testing has ended for another year and it’s concluded in the exact same manner it started: a Red Bull at the top of the timesheets and the RB19 appearing as a very strong package for the Austrian side’s title defence.
The next time the 2023 F1 cars will hit the track will be for the opening grand prix of the year, taking place next week at the same Bahrain International Circuit venue as the past three days of testing.
Keyword: Perez beats Hamilton to top final day of F1 testing