While most of us are unable to drawn any significant conclusions from pre-season testing, Ferrari's Felipe Massa, who finished third in the 2006 Drivers' Championship, claims that BMW is the team to watch, and that it is currently ahead of his team and McLaren.

"The McLaren definitely looks quick but for me the BMW is the best of all at the moment," he told Gazzetta dello Sport. "I say that not just looking at this final day, but at their consistency when they did long-distance simulations. "They were impressive in Valencia and here as well. They did very, very interesting tests.

"The McLaren is the quickest over a single lap," he admitted, "but BMW are impressively consistent even if maybe they are not yet the most reliable. For now, I put them ahead of Ferrari and McLaren."

Referring to his own team's pre-season programme, he said: "We are where we expected to be. The car is proving to be quick and reliable, even if we have had a few problems.

"But we know how to fix them," he added.

Looking ahead to next week's three-day test at Barcelona, for many teams the final pre-season test in Europe, the outlook is bleak, with forecast for Tuesday and Wednesday.