McLaren's Norris sweeps F2's first pre-season test day

The rookie F2 racer, driving for the returning Carlin outfit, was quickest both in the rain-affected morning session and on a dry track in the afternoon, ending the day with a best effort of 1m43.095s.

Tuesday's track action marked the first collective timed test for the new halo-fitted Dallara F2 2018 car, three weeks on from the shakedown runs at Magny-Cours.

Norris topped the morning session with a 1m56.136s lap on wets, ending the first half of the test day nine tenths clear of his nearest rival, MP Motorsport's new signing Ralph Boschung.

The Brit was quickest for a fair chunk of the afternoon, too, but was shuffled down the order soon after the session entered its final hour – only to soon reclaim the top spot for good.

Fellow McLaren junior Nyck de Vries, who joined reigning champion outfit Prema in the off-season, finished the day in second place, two tenths off the pace.

Norris' Carlin teammate Sergio Sette Camara was a close third, as he had been in the morning session, despite having triggered one of its numerous red-flag stoppages with an off.

Luca Ghiotto was fourth on the day for Campos, ahead of ART's Mercedes-backed reigning GP3 champion George Russell and the other Prema car of Sean Gelael.

Russell's ART teammate Jack Aitken, who was recently named Renault's F1 reserve, took seventh overall, heading the BWT-liveried cars of Arden teammates Nirei Fukuzumi and Maximilian Gunther.

Williams junior Oliver Rowland, testing for DAMS in place of the sidelined Nicholas Latifi, made up the top 10, with his squadmate Alex Albon 14th after sitting out almost the entire afternoon due to an engine change.

Ex-F1 driver Roberto Merhi was 16th for MP, while Russian Time's 2017 F2 runner-up Artem Markelov propped up the order, without a slick-tyre laptime to his name.

Test results

Pos.	Driver	Team	AM	PM
1	Lando Norris	Carlin	1:56.136	1:43.095
2	Nyck de Vries	Prema	2:00.088	1:43.282
3	Sergio Sette Camara	Carlin	1:57.289	1:43.401
4	Luca Ghiotto	Campos	2:00.067	1:43.707
5	George Russell	ART Grand Prix	2:04.282	1:43.745
6	Sean Gelael	Prema	2:00.095	1:43.844
7	Jack Aitken	ART Grand Prix	No Time	1:44.115
8	Nirei Fukuzumi	BWT Arden	1:59.759	1:44.232
9	Maximilian Gunther	BWT Arden	1:57.742	1:44.277
10	Oliver Rowland	DAMS	2:12.894	1:44.345
11	Arjun Maini	Trident	1:57.591	1:44.522
12	Ralph Boschung	MP Motorsport	1:57.037	1:44.603
13	Louis Deletraz	Charouz	1:58.619	1:44.807
14	Alexander Albon	DAMS	1:57.357	1:44.950
15	Santino Ferrucci	Trident	1:58.899	1:45.023
16	Roberto Merhi	MP Motorsport	1:58.358	1:45.086
17	Roy Nissany	Campos	2:03.983	1:46.166
18	Antonio Fuoco	Charouz	1:58.780	1:46.480
19	Tadasuke Makino	Russian Time	2:03.229	1:47.050
20	Artem Markelov	Russian Time	2:10.443	No Time