After the end of the last preseason test, times among the front runners on qualifying fuel setups were VERY close. Any surprises here?
Lewis Hamilton ended winter testing with the fastest time at Catalunya - but the most significant aspect of the final day of running was that just half a second covered the top eight cars.
With most of the field trying low fuel qualifying simulations today, the rapid and ultra-close times bode well for a thrilling start to the 2010 season.
Hamilton set his best lap of 1m20.472s in the morning before switching to longer runs in the afternoon, with his 'race pace' looking slightly faster than comparable stints from Ferrari's Felipe Massa and Mercedes' Michael Schumacher.
But it was Red Bull that emerged as Hamilton's closest challenger on raw speed.
Following an issue-filled Saturday, Red Bull opted to give both Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber a run today, with the German handing over to his Australian team-mate at lunchtime.
Webber quickly got up to speed and ended up just 0.024s behind Hamilton in second, with Vettel fifth, just under 0.2s further back.
Massa put Ferrari third when he tried low fuel, with Schumacher sixth but just 0.273s off the pace.
Another German was one of the sensations of the afternoon, as Adrian Sutil and Force India went on a string of qualifying runs and worked their way down to a superb 1m20.611s.
That put Sutil fourth, only 0.139s slower than Hamilton's benchmark.
Williams' Rubens Barrichello and Sauber's Kamui Kobayashi completed the eight-strong group within 0.5s when they both tried qualifying runs later on.
They also caused two of the three red flags that blighted the final half hour of the session - Lotus' Heikki Kovalainen prompting the other.
Toro Rosso and Renault appeared to opt out of the glory runs, with Sebastien Buemi and Robert Kubica some distance off the leaders' pace in ninth and 10th.
Kubica was delayed by a gearbox problem in the morning, but did manage a race distance later.
The newcomers again brought up the rear, with Lotus running smoothly until Kovalainen's late problem, while Virgin had further hydraulic issues and only completed 47 laps with Lucas di Grassi.
Testing times from Barcelona (Sunday 28 February)
1 HAMILTON McLaren 1m20.472s (134)
2 WEBBER Red Bull 1m20.496s (59)
3 MASSA Ferrari 1m20.539s (105)
4 SUTIL Force India 1m20.611s (99)
5 VETTEL Red Bull 1m20.667s (76)
6 SCHUMACHER Mercedes 1m20.745s (122)
7 BARRICHELLO Williams 1m20.870s (83)
8 KOBAYASHI Sauber 1m20.911s (67)
9 BUEMI Toro Rosso 1m22.135s (87)
10 KUBICA Renault 1m23.175s (106)
11 KOVALAINEN Lotus 1m25.251s (65)
11 DI GRASSI Virgin 1m26.160s (47)
