Alpine revealed Franco Colapinto's schedule for the second round of testing in Bahrain
Alpine revealed the schedule for the second Bahrain tests
porEditorial Team
Argentina
The Argentine driver is preparing for the final stretch of preseason before the formal start of Formula 1 at the Australian Grand Prix
Formula 1 will close its preseason this week with three days of testing at the Bahrain International Circuit, in Bahrain, and Alpine has already defined how it will distribute the work between Franco Colapinto and Pierre Gasly. The Argentine driver will take on a leading role in the decisive phase of the A526's setup.
According to the schedule released by the French team, Gasly will open Wednesday's running in the morning session (from 4 to 8 a.m. in Argentina), while Colapinto will take the wheel in the afternoon session (from 9 to 1). The second day will be entirely for the driver from Pilar and finally Friday will be exclusively in the Frenchman's hands.
El cronograma de Alpine en la segunda tanda de prácticas en Bahréin
The tests will take place between February 18 and 20 and each day will be divided into two blocks: one in the morning and another in the afternoon, separated by a one-hour break. All sessions will be broadcast in Latin America on Disney+ and Fox Sports.
Colapinto arrives at this final stint with significant mileage already accumulated. In the first week of testing in Bahrain he completed 172 laps. On Wednesday he was only able to run 28 lapsdue to mechanical issues, but on Friday he had the car at his disposal all day and added 144 laps, with a best time of 1:35.806, the fastest lap set by Alpine in Sakhir so far.
During that day he worked both on fast laps and on long runs with race pace and he used all the tire compounds available, with the focus on data collection rather than on the timesheets. Meanwhile, Gasly, who also suffered some failures in the A526, completed 146 laps in total.
Colapinto sigue adaptándose a su nuevo monoplaza
Before Bahrain, the Argentine driver had already seen action in private tests at Barcelona, where he completed 118 laps over two days. In total, he will reach the end of preseason with almost 1,500 kilometers (932 miles) covered in the new single-seater.
With the start of the championship getting closer and closer, these final hours on track will be decisive in order to finish fine-tuning technical details and consolidating impressions. For Colapinto, in addition, they will represent a new opportunity to continue adapting in a key year for his projection in Formula 1.
