The most consistent weather conditions of the entire test on the final day of testing for the winter here in Jerez, allowed McLaren driver Jenson Button to power through a tyre compound evaluation program, balancing aero and mechanical set-ups to the different types of tyre and finish at the top of the leaderboard.

In the morning, Jenson completed a number of shorter runs on three separate tyre compounds, evaluating set-ups before switching to longer runs in the afternoon, with a view to evaluating the tyres’ durability.

Second quickest was the Renault of Robert Kubica who made good progress with the team’s technical program. After evaluation of fuel loads in the morning, attention switched to long runs in the afternoon along with set-up work. Robert completed 117 laps and set the second quickest time of the day.

“It was a good day and we tried a lot of different things, which has given us lots of useful information,” he said. “To begin with we did some evaluation with different fuel loads to check the balance of the car and then in the afternoon we did long runs with heavy fuel to simulate a race distance. We completed most of the programme and I was pretty happy with the car.”

The Sauber of Kamui Kobayashi had a good final day to finish third when after a difficult day here yesterday, they worked on the set-up of the car, tested different tyre compounds and did some aerodynamic evaluations. Thanks to the good conditions and the reliability of the car, the Hinwil based squad were able to complete their overall testing programme for this track.

“I’m really happy with our final day of testing in Jerez,” the Japanese driver said. “It was a perfect day for us. The conditions were ideal and the car ran trouble-free, so we were able to complete 117 laps and gather a lot of data. We made some progress with the set- up of the car. We will now analyse the data and draw the relevant conclusions for the next test in Barcelona.”

Tonio Liuzzi concluded Force India’s positive test to a close after covering a total of 80 laps of the Spanish track, following a program that included work on set-up and understanding the car's behaviour with the heavier fuel loads necessitated by the race refuelling ban this year. His fastest lap of 1:19.650 was the fourth quickest of the day.

“Today was a really productive day for us,” Tonio said. “We covered 80 laps without any issues and got through our programme of test items for this week. Everything went pretty well - we worked on understanding the car's performance with different fuel loads and ran through some set-up changes and the car is responding well. We still need to work on the tyres over the longer runs and will continue this at the next test in Barcelona. Overall I think we can be very satisfied with how this test has gone and can look forward to another good test next week.”

Nico Rosberg was at the wheel of the MGP W01 today for Mercedes’ final day of testing, the young German following a program that concentrated on chassis set-up work over longer runs alongside a tyre comparison program. The weather stayed dry throughout enabling a very productive day for the team with Nico completing 130 laps with a quickest lap time of 1:20.061.

"We've had a very positive day today and were able to complete a lot of valuable mileage which is a great way to end the tests here in Jerez,” he said. “We've made some good progress on our set-up comparisons and learnt a lot which will be useful to prepare for the final test in Barcelona. Being able to get the laps in dry conditions has been very helpful for me to get used to the car and systems."

Fernando Alonso was next for Ferrari, the Spanish driver working mainly on trying out different set-up options on the car and, at the end of the afternoon, he completed a race simulation. In total, Alonso did 137 laps, the quickest in a time of 1.20.436.

In the morning session Toro Rosso’s Jaime Alguersuari completed some aero evaluation runs while in the afternoon, the team tackled a race simulation. Over the whole day, the STR5 completed the equivalent of over two race distances to finish seventh overall.

“That is encouraging on the reliability front,” said Chief Engineer, Laurent Mekies. “Even with the rain interrupting our programme this week, it has been quite a useful test, working on both dry and wet weather basic set-up. However, there is still a fair amount of work to do before the first race in Bahrain and we hope to get a lot more testing miles under our belt, in Barcelona next week.”

Mark Webber began testing the RB6 this morning with a series of long runs to evaluate three different Bridgestone tyre compounds. After three successful runs, the Aussie racer’s fourth was stopped late morning when the car had an engine failure. The team lost around two and a half hours of running time while a replacement was fitted, but Mark was back out on track in the afternoon. After an installation lap, he completed one very long run, as the team continued its tyre testing.

“It was frustrating test with the wet weather over the first two days, but having two dry days at the end was good and enabled us to get some good mileage on the car,” said Ian Morgan, Head of Race Engineering. “Next week’s test in Barcelona will concentrate on our final preparations before Bahrain, including some race simulations.”

Nico Hülkenberg, Timo Glock and Jarno Trulli rounded out the eleven drivers on track.