BARCELONA — Australia's Daniel Ricciardo was fastest on the second day of pre-season testing here Friday as world champion Lewis Hamilton made a surprise return after missing much of the opening day due to a fever. Ricciardo managed to put his Red Bull through a full race simulation of 143 laps, including time on the faster soft tires which allowed him to record the quickest time of the week so far at the Circuit de Catalunya in 1min 24.574. Hamilton replaced teammate Nico Rosberg, who is suffering from a neck injury, for the afternoon session and didn't waste any time as he reeled off 89 laps as Mercedes again prioritized mileage over speed. The Englishman and the German were only fifth and sixth fastest respectively, but once again logged the most laps after Rosberg completed 66 in the morning. Ferrari remains the most consistent team when it comes to speed through six days of testing as Kimi Raikkonen was second fastest in his 90 laps. Meanwhile, there was even some encouragement for the embattled McLaren-Honda relationship as despite warning it could suffer limited running time due to a faulty seal, it managed its most successful day of testing so far as two-time world champion Fernando Alonso completed 59 laps. The end of the afternoon session marked the halfway stage of testing with six more days to come in Barcelona over the next nine days before the season gets underway for real at the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne on March 15. Marussia fights back The former Marussia Formula One team has won a battle to come out of bankruptcy administration and is hoping to get back onto the Grand Prix grid this year. Four months after the collapse of the Russia-backed team, the administrators said creditors had given approval for "control of the company to be passed back to the directors" after new investment was found. Marussia has reportedly been given new cash backing by former Sainsbury's supermarket chief executive Justin King and other new investors. The team, now trading as Manor F1, has been allowed to start operating again under a so-called Company Voluntary Arrangement (CVA). "We are pleased that the financial restructuring of the company has been progressed after creditor approval of the CVA," said chief administrator Geoff Rowley. "With new investment and a continuity of the respected management, the business has the ideal platform from which it can accelerate the operational rebuilding already underway to get a team back racing," he added. Marussia collapsed on Oct. 27 with debts of more than £60 million ($92 million), much of it to Ferrari which had made the team's engines. Graeme Lowdon and John Booth, former sporting director and team principal of Marussia, have since fought to revive the team after Russian tycoon Andrei Cheglakov withdrew as the main backer. Formula One teams recently voted against letting Manor compete in this year's Formula One championship with a modified version of last year's car. But the team has moved back to a former base at Dinnington, south Yorkshire. About 200 staff were laid off in October, but some have been taken back on to work on a car that could compete this year. — Agencies
