The competitive picture is still unclear after a day on which many of the teams and drivers admitted they were struggling to work out the optimum use of energy with this year’s new engines. Management of the hybrid system is critical with the power split about 50-50 between internal combustion engine and electrical power.

Mercedes, though, set highly impressive times on their race-distance runs late in the session that seemed to underline their position as pre-season favourites.

Ferrari, also fancied by many coming into the season, spent much of the day at the top of the times, only to be usurped by McLaren and Mercedes.

Australian Piastri said: “If you can operate the car roughly how you expect it to, then you find a huge amount of lap time.

“I think we have been there or thereabouts. don’t think we ever thought we were a long way behind Mercedes and Ferrari. I think we thought we were just a little step behind. And I am optimistic that if we get everything in a more optimal place, maybe we don’t have the outright performance if everyone’s at 100% but the biggest thing is how close you can get to 100% at the moment.”

Antonelli added: “Massive learning every time we go on track and we understand more about the track. It looks like it is a close fight with the top teams. It is not going to be easy. Ferrari, McLaren, Red Bull, they all look strong.”

Verstappen’s pace was hidden by problems on his soft tyre runs and an off at the high-speed Turn 10 on his long run.