F1 Pre-Season Testing 2019: Wednesday Times and Analysis from Barcelona

McLaren hit new heights in pre-season Formula One testing on Wednesday morning as Carlos Sainz topped the timesheets with the fastest lap so far in Barcelona. 

After his team-mate, Lando Norris, set the fastest time on Tuesday, the Spaniard returned a lap time of one minute, 17.144 seconds to better Nico Hulkenberg's previous benchmark from last week:

Here are the top times from Wednesday morning:

It has been a positive pre-season for McLaren at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, but they still endured some problems when Sainz drew a red flag midway through the morning's action after he ground to a halt on the main straight due to "a loss of water pressure."

Sebastian Vettel also had some issues in his Ferrari and caused a 40-minute delay when he went into the barriers at Turn 3:

The German was given a clean bill of health after a brief visit to the medical centre, but Ferrari said his car "will not go out on track for a few hours," per Michael Emons of BBC Sport. 

The only other stoppage of the morning came when Max Verstappen stopped at the end of the pit straight in his Red Bull, drawing another red flag.

Vettel and Verstappen were the two drivers who ran Sainz the closest in the morning session as they finished second and third fastest, respectively. 

Meanwhile, Valtteri Bottas finished fourth in the Mercedes with a 1:18.941 while completing 74 laps, more than any other driver.

The world champions have been relatively quite for most of pre-season testing so far, but they will likely be delighted with Wednesday's running after enduring some problems on Tuesday.