Worries for Red Bull with Force India going fastest in Bahrain

Formula 1 went in for the biggest change in the rules in its history with taking the sport more towards “Green Technology”.
F1 has adopted 1.6-litre V6 hybrid turbo engines and a fuel restriction, as well as significant changes to the aerodynamic rules.
Red Bull’s troubles in 2014 continued in Bahrain during the first day of second pre-season testing where Vettel could complete only 14 laps in the first test.
Red Bull racing was delayed by 5 hours citing to the problems in building the car and when they finally got running at around 1:45pm Sebastian Vettel made a bit of progress, eventually climbing to fifth on the timesheet before the RB10 slowed to a halt trackside with a mechanical issue, with more than an hour remaining for the close of day. This raised a few eyebrows and some questions being asked “If it slowed to a halt, then why did it sit smouldering with badly flat spotted tyres at the end of lengthy skid marks after completing purple sectors?” This surely sounds that Vettel was pushing it as hard as he dare and trying to get the maximum out of his car from the very beginning.
“Obviously we’re not happy with where we are now and we have a long way of ahead of us. The first gut feeling from the car is OK but we need more running,” said Vettel after the session. “It’s not easy to find a quick fix but I think we understand the problems. We sorted out the issues from Jerez and we were able to do some laps today. However, very often you fix one problem and another pops up, which is what happened.”
On the other hand Force India had a comfortable day with Nico Hulkenberg clocking the fastest time of the day at 1:36.880, which was followed by Ferrari’s Alonso (0.999 second slower) and Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton. Nico also tested the reliability of his Mercedes’ power unit successfully completing 78 laps. Other Mercedes runners also did a number of laps testing their engines with Kevin Magnusses completing 81 laps for McLaren and even Lewis Hamilton completing 74 laps for Mercedes. Despite completing 74 laps, Hamilton was not completely happy with how his testing went as he was troubled by a braking problem. "We didn’t get as much running as we would like but it’s only the first day," he said.
But the most number of laps were done by the Ferrari powered, Sauber driver Adrian Sutil completing 82 laps, whereas Ferrari could manage only 64 laps, even as the Ferrari being sidelined by a “fuel mix” problem briefly during the morning session.
If you are thinking that Red Bull was the only car fully sidelined then you are sadly mistaken as the much anticipated Lotus’ E22 which was supposed to have a full debut in Bahrain was also among the few to be shaken away. Romain Grosjean was able to manage only 8 laps in his Lotus which was marred by numerous problems relating to battery and software. Not only this, Torro Rosso’s Daniil Kvyat was also hit by some trouble with the morning laps being erased by an oil leak followed by an unspecified issue bringing the car to a standstill prematurely. Marussia was also hit by “IT Configuration” as they tried to figure out a way to get track ready. Of the Renault-powered teams, only Caterham managed decent mileage, with reserve driver Robin Frijns doing 58 laps.
Engineers predict the cars will be in the region of two seconds slower than last year by the time of the first race in Melbourne on 16 March, and will continue to evolve rapidly through the season. At least half a second of that deficit is caused by tyre supplier Pirelli using harder rubber compounds to cope with the greater demands of the new engines.
Following are the Lap timings for Day 1 in Bahrain Pre-test
1. Nico Hulkenberg Force India 1:36.880 78 laps
2. Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1:37.879 64 laps
3. Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:37.908 74 laps
4. Kevin Magnussen McLaren 1:38.295 81 laps
5. Sebastian Vettel Red Bull Racing 1:40.224 14 laps
6. Adrian Sutil Sauber 1:40.443 82 laps
7. Robin Frijns Caterham 1:42.534 68 laps
8. Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso 1:44.346 5 laps
9. Romain Grosjean Lotus 1:44.832 8 laps
9. Felipe Massa Williams No time 5 laps
10. Jules Bianchi Marussia No time 3 laps