Sergio Perez says Red Bull will evaluate the ultimate pace of their new RB18 on the final day of pre-season testing in Bahrain, having so far concentrated primarily on putting in as much mileage as possible to increase their understanding of the new machine. Perez, who did the most laps of anyone during his day at the wheel on Thursday as he logged 138 tours of the circuit en route to 10th place in the times, has just half a day left before the season begins as he shares driving duties with Max Verstappen on Saturday. It's during that short four-hour session that Perez says the team will prepare the car for quicker runs. "So far, we haven't done any performance running," Perez told media, including RacingNews365.com , when asked about the performance of the RB18. "I think, at some point, we have to do [some] and there's only half a day left in the car. "So, tomorrow, we are going to be doing more performance running, and we'll see how the car feels in those types of circumstances."
Perez points out weakness of 2022 F1 cars
Having had more time driving to compare how the 2022 car handles compared to the previous generation, Perez said there's a clear difference in philosophy at certain corners. "I think there's so much to learn from these cars at the moment," he commented. "Definitely, the weakness comes in the low speed and medium speeds, [while] high speed seems to be fairly good compared to last year. "I think, as we go through the season - by race 10 or so - we will all figure out how to best operate these cars, how to bring the balance a lot closer and you will see [fewer] issues. "But, at the moment, the cars are so heavy that you really feel it going into the low-speed [corners]."
A strong start to the Bahrain test for Red Bull
Despite the lack of headline times from Red Bull, Perez was pleased with how his day in the cockpit had unfolded on Thursday. "Yesterday, I think we've had a good day," he added. "Plenty of laps, a lot of kilometres in the car... I'm looking forward to my final half-day. "I think one of the things here is that the track is changing so much from one hour to the next. The wind, the temperature – it's difficult to make any predictions on that but, so far, I'll say that we've had a good start."
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