Bahrain International Circuit, Friday, 13 February

Find out what happened on Day 3 of Pre-Season Testing 1 in Bahrain, and get the thoughts of McLaren Mastercard Formula 1 driver Oscar Piastri and Team Principal Andrea Stella.

McLaren Mastercard Formula 1 Team concluded Bahrain Pre-Season Testing 1 with Oscar Piastri completing 161 laps, the second consecutive day a McLaren Mastercard driver has covered the most distance. This results in a total distance of 2,283.864km from 422 total laps completed by Lando and Oscar across three days of productive running at the Bahrain International Circuit.

Oscar started Friday morning’s session on a similar programme to the one completed by Lando during yesterday’s running. This involved further aerodynamic testing for the team, focusing on a number of runs with aero rakes attached to collect valuable data. This will provide further understanding and development across all areas of the MCL40 before moving on to longer runs.

The afternoon session saw the team move onto additional race simulation with lots of laps completed, providing important practice for Oscar as he performed multiple overtaking manoeuvres, giving the Australian driver key insight into race preparation and what managing the car in traffic could look like this season.

Overall, the first week of Pre-Season Testing has given the team the opportunity to gather key learnings across all areas, including car setup, exploiting power unit performance, and overall reliability.

The team recognises that there will be lots of opportunities for further learning throughout next week’s Bahrain Pre-Season Testing 2. However, before the MCL40 returns to track action on Wednesday, all data from the last three days in Sakhir will be reviewed and analysed collectively with the entire team, both trackside and in Woking.

Full plans for McLaren Mastercard’s Bahrain Pre-Season Testing 2 programme will be announced in due course, with Lando and Oscar continuing to share driving duties throughout the final week of 2026’s pre-season testing.

Oscar Piastri

"A productive first week of testing done. The car ran well and we've learned a lot about what it likes and what it doesn't like. It's going to take a while to get used to driving these cars and how to get the most out of them, so there’s still a lot to learn. I am looking forward to getting back out there next week and keeping this learning going. A big thanks to the team for their work which has meant we've been able to get a lot of laps on the board and maximise our programme.”

Andrea Stella, Team Principal

“Today concludes a constructive and productive first phase of Pre-Season Testing in Bahrain with a total of 2,283.864km completed by Lando and Oscar across the last three days. This is very encouraging to see with lots of key learnings to take away. With that said, and while it is still difficult to accurately identify the order of performance, it is clear that Mercedes and Ferrari are currently more competitive than us. We have some work to do to find performance ahead of the second test next week and the first race in Melbourne.

”From a testing perspective, both drivers have provided valuable data from every individual lap in each of their sessions. The aerodynamic testing undertaken both yesterday and today provides the team with particularly valuable information that will play an important part on the next steps of our development for the MCL40. It was also useful for Lando and Oscar to complete race simulations as part of their programme, including some running with other cars. There are some areas we need to work on, both as a team and as a sport, but we leave the first test with a better understanding of these requirements.

“Finally, thanks go to the team for their hard work and dedication to get us to this point. There is still a significant amount of work to do, but each lap we complete gives us additional learning, and that isn’t possible without the hard work of the team both here in Bahrain and back in Woking. We look forward to heading back out on track next week.”