Sainz tops morning session as Vettel crashes out

F1 Test, Barcelona, Circuit de Catalunya

Carlos Sainz topped the timesheet at the end of the morning session of day 2 of test 2 at Barcelona. He follows team mate Lando Norris who had put McLaren on top the previous day.

The bigger news was perhaps a crash from Sebastian Vettel midway through the session. The German Ferrari driver got off track in the high speed Turn 3 and went straight on in the barriers. Ferrari rapidly reported there was a mechanical failure involved.

As Vettel was seemingly unhurt, but still brought to the medical centre for some basic checks, the incident caused a 40 minute red flag situation before the car was brought back to the pits and the tecpro barriers were restored.

Vettel crash wasn't the only red flag situation of the morning though, as Sainz' McLaren had also stopped before that, just on the exit of the pitlane. In that case, the McLaren was just wheeled back into the pits, rather than being picked up by the truck. The problem appeared minor, as 20 minutes after that stoppage, the Spaniard was already running again, only to be stopped 5 minutes later by Vettel's red flag.

Despite the interruptions, Bottas still managed to complete a solid 74 laps for Mercedes, closely followed by Daniel Ricciardo with 72.