Red Bull finally showed some pace as reliability problems hit early favourites Mercedes in the final pre-season test in Bahrain. Despite ongoing problems, Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo was third fastest and managed a total of 66 laps compared to the 122 of Alonso and 108 of Perez.
Mercedes were forced to curtail running early for a second successive day with Lewis Hamilton seventh fastest. Hamilton was stopped by a gearbox problem after doing 89 laps.
Perez was fastest for the second consecutive day with a time 0.064 seconds faster than Alonso and 0.173 quicker than Ricciardo. Hamilton was 3.471 adrift of the Mexican and behind Williams’s Felipe Massa, McLaren’s Jenson Button and Marussia’s Jules Bianchi.
