Final testing is underway at Barcelona’s Circuit de Catalunya from Tuesday through until Saturday and with the cancellation of the Bahrain GP a replacement testing session is being held to give the teams some much needed track time before the Australian Formula 1 Grand Prix.

In little under three weeks’ time everyone will be assembled on the Melbourne grid readying themselves for the start of the Australian Grand Prix. But before the curtain is raised on the 2011 championship, the teams have one last chance to wrap up their development programmes, evaluate new upgrades and improve their cars at this week’s final pre-season test.

Following the cancellation of the Bahrain race and the preceding Sakhir test, the pre-season schedule had to be hastily rearranged. This week’s replacement session is being held at Barcelona’s Circuit de Catalunya from Tuesday to Saturday, with the teams running four-day programmes.

The majority will be in action at the Spanish track from Tuesday. Red Bull, McLaren, Renault, Sauber and Toro Rosso are set to keep their testers on the bench and use their race drivers on all four days. Lotus will also test from Tuesday, although the opening day will see their reserves (and GP2 drivers) Davide Valsecchi and Luiz Razia spend the morning sampling the T128.

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