New man in red Vettel sets fastest time in Jerez testing

At the time of writing, there was business as usual for many and, for others, a no-show. As expected, it was the champions who set the pace, with Nico Rosberg of Mercedes putting in some quick times, only to be usurped by the new man in red, Sebastian Vettel with the Ferrari, clocking a time four-tenths of a second quicker on the first day. But what was impressive and a little ominous for the rest of the field was not the speed, but the overall performance of the Mercedes.

Covering more than twice the normal race distance, the Silver Arrow reportedly never missed a beat. That is a solid throwing down of the proverbial gauntlet, if ever I saw one. Even Vettel commented Merc’s performance was more significant than his quickest time on Day One.Most fans have been watching McLaren, but like Abu Dhabi at the end of last season, it was once again a very inauspicious start to 2015.

Fernando Alonso only managed six laps on the first day before problems once again plagued the Woking team. The Honda engineers announce they have cured the pro-blem and will be ready for the se-cond day. I believe it’s a good job Alonso has decided to be patient and build with the team, as it certainly is not going well at present.With Red Bull sporting the camouflage look for the RB11, it appears Renault and the team are having a better start than last year.

Williams look as strong as ever with Valtteri Bottas putting in some solid laps.Conspicuous by their absence has been Force India and Lotus – the former opting to miss the Jerez sessions completely. Lotus were hoping to run the E23 on the third day of testing and the combination of the new chassis and Mercedes power could be the one to watch.

Then they surprise us all when Pastor Maldonado ran an installation lap.

After the Jerez testing it will be another two weeks before the second series begins at Barcelona.Hopefully, by then we will have a full complement of teams and perhaps will have learned a little more about the fate of Caterham and Marussia.

So what have we learnt so far? Not an awful lot, if we have to be honest.Ferrari are looking as if they have found more pace, but have we yet seen the true speed of the Mercedes, or are they just running reliability programmes?

If other teams have made the sort of gains we have seen from the Maranello team and if Mercedes are not that much quicker, then maybe, just maybe, 2015 could be a cracker of a season.

While this is all going on, the media is buzzing with comments about 1 000hp (750 kW) engines in the future.

Without going into details, it would appear certain team bosses and drivers are relishing the idea of this dream becoming a reality in the not too distant future.

It makes me wonder if anyone really knows where F1 is headed, towards high technology, which is the present direction, or back to the days of brutish power and driver skills?

I am quite sure this will create a divided opinion, but I would not mind betting the fan base will have already made up their minds.