The top 3 have held back a lot with their fastest laps, a point really brought home by that table posted in another thread showing the difference between best 2019 testing time and 2018 qualifying time for each team.Zoue wrote:my understanding is the race sims had Ferrari 2-3 tenths quicker.pokerman wrote:Fastest laps don't mean that much anyway, with Vettel doing a 1-16.7 on the C3's then the 1-16.2 lap on C5's is clearly not ultimate pace so Hamilton matching that doesn't mean anything which is basically the point I was making.Zoue wrote:It doesn’t, though. Because we can extrapolate all we want but the fact remains that on identical tyres Vettel and Hamilton posted near-identical times. Which puts them pretty close to each other and I think it’s fair to say both were trying, at least on the fastest tyre. It’s doubtful either had the engines cranked up to party mode but that’s likely to be the only variable left.pokerman wrote:Indeed just going off those times puts Ferrari 3 to 4 tenths quicker.Invade wrote:The reality is that in appearances Ferrari look best. What especially strikes me are two particular laps: Leclerc 17.2 on C2 and Vettel 16.7 on C3. By comparison, Hamilton managed a 16.6 on the C4.
Ferrari are very quick. Mercedes are probably behind but not by too much.
More important are the race sims were Ferrari look to be 0.5s quicker, this is were the experts try to determine which are the faster cars.
Overall I'd agree the Ferrari looks like the quicker car so far and going by Bottas' comments the Merc looks trickier to dial in. However the last minute display by Mercedes does tend to indicate they've been holding back a bit and there might be more to come from them. Don't forget Hamilton also put a lap on the C4s which was 2-3 tenths quicker than anything the Ferraris had done (see further up this page), so it's also possible that different tyres suit the cars better.
In summary for me advantage Ferrari but I wouldn't write Mercedes off just yet
Every team improved on their 2018 time (by 0.8 - 1.5 seconds) apart from the top three, who set almost exactly the same time. Either the midfield have massively outdeveloped Ferrari & Mercedes or they're holding back by at least 0.5 - 1.0 seconds so it's way too early to call it either way at this point IMO.