Ferrari junior Shwartzman was the only young driver to take part in the test run at the Yas Marina Circuit on Wednesday, while the rest of the field fielded modified mule cars on the new 18-inch tires for 2022.
The teams were only allowed to field a young driver on one of the two test days; on Tuesday, all Bar Haas had decided to do so.
On test day Shwartzman set a fastest lap time of 1: 25.348 minutes with 40 minutes remaining, which earned him the top spot almost half a second ahead of McLaren’s Lando Norris.
Norris finished second in a modified version of McLaren’s 2021 MCL35M car and completed more than 100 laps on Pirelli’s 2022 compounds made available to mule car drivers. Shwartzman’s run was completed on the 13-inch tires used that year.
Norris started the day testing a new LED lighting system on the McLaren’s rear wheel covers, a sign of future technology that is in
Sebastian Vettel recovered from a hydraulic problem that morning that resulted in a stall and a red flag to end the day for Aston Martin in third. He completed more than two race distances for the team and set his fastest lap in the last five minutes of the session.
George Russell finished fourth for Mercedes after a second day of running in the Mercedes W10 Mule-Car from 2019 and finished six tenths of a second behind Norris’ lap time.
Pierre Gasly finished fifth for AlphaTauri ahead of Carlos Sainz, who finished sixth in the Ferrari, while Fernando Alonso drove almost 150 laps on the way to seventh for Alpine.
Guanyu Zhou, Alfa Romeo Racing C39 mule
Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images
F1 2022 rookie Guanyu Zhou continued to do the laps for Alfa Romeo ahead of his official debut next year, with the team having met their young driver on Tuesday. He replaced Valtteri Bottas in the mule wagon on Wednesday and finished eighth in the overall standings, a tenth of a second ahead of Sergio Perez in the Red Bull, with 150 laps on the board.
Pietro Fittipaldi has secured the starting order for Haas in 10th place after completing his mule wagon by Wednesday. Williams did not attend the test session on Wednesday due to the lack of a mule cart.
F1 will return to the Barcelona track with official tests at the end of February.
Results:
| Item | driver | team | time | gap | Round |
| 1 | Robert Shwartzman | Haas | 1.25.348 | 130 | |
| 2 | Lando Norris | McLaren | 1.25.809 | +0.461 | 103 |
| 3 | Sebastian Vettel | Aston Martin | 1.26.379 | +1,031 | 134 |
| 4th | George Russell | Mercedes | 1.26.404 | +1,056 | 82 |
| 5 | Pierre Gasly | AlphaTauri | 1.26.451 | +1.103 | 149 |
| 6th | Carlos Sainz | Ferrari | 1.26.706 | +1,358 | 151 |
| 7th | Fernando Alonso | alpine | 1.26.940 | +1,592 | 148 |
| 8th | Guanyu Zhou | Alfa Romeo | 1.27.850 | +2,508 | 159 |
| 9 | Sergio Perez | Red Bull | 1.27.991 | +2,643 | 118 |
| 10 | Pietro Fittipaldi | Haas | 1.28.622 | +3,274 | 123 |
