Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team's Finnish driver Valtteri Bottas drives at the Circuit de Catalunya on March 1, 2017 in Montmelo on the outskirts of Barcelona during the third day of the first week of tests for the Formula One Grand Prix season. / AFP / JOSE JORDAN (Photo credit should read JOSE JORDAN/AFP/Getty Images)

Valtteri Bottas topped the timesheets for the third day of testing here at the Circuit de Catalonia in Spain, the Mercedes driver recording a total of 75 laps to add to the 94 completed by his teammate to bring Mercedes’ tally to 169 laps for the day.

The Finn’s best overall time was two and half tenths quicker than Sebastien Vettel in the Ferrari, who also managed to put a lot of mileage on his new 2017 car with 139 laps under his belt for the day.

Meanwhile, Aussie driver Daniel Ricciardo, had a better day today with 70 laps in his Red Bull to finish third.

McLaren meanwhile, finally had a day where Fernando Alonso could put some decent mileage on his Honda engine with 72 laps to finish tenth fastest.

“Today has been a much more successful day, and we’re happy that we’ve been able to execute our testing programme proper with a full day of running. I’m pleased to report that there were no major issues, and the team completed our planned run programme for the day,” said Eric Boullier.

“We’re confident that the issues we’ve experienced so far are glitches and part of the usual challenges faced in testing. The problems on Monday and Tuesday meant we lost valuable track time, which means glitches that occur in day one can then spread into day three, simply because of the lack of mileage.”

“The more we run, the more we learn, and, naturally, the more there is potential for issues to be discovered that we need to fix. However, there is a minimum mileage figure that we can do that allows us enough data to understand the car and how to set it up, and from there we can move forward. While we shouldn’t get carried away, today’s running has provided the team with a boost after a tricky couple of days, and I hope we continue collecting more mileage and data tomorrow to end the first week.”

Times from day three:

  1. Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 1:19.705s 75 laps
  2. Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 1:19.952s 139 laps
  3. Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull Racing 1:21.153s 70 laps
  4. Jolyon Palmer Renault 1:21.396s 51 laps
  5. Nico Hulkenberg Renault 1:21.791s 42 laps
  6. Marcus Ericsson Sauber 1:21.824s 126 laps
  7. Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:22.090s 94 laps
  8. Romain Grosjean Haas 1:22.118s 56 laps
  9. Lance Stroll Williams 1:22.351s 98 laps
  10. Fernando Alonso McLaren-Honda 1:22.598s 72 laps
  11. Carlos Sainz Toro Rosso 1:23.540s 32 laps
  12. Alfonso Celis Force India 1:23.568s 71 laps
  13. Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso 1:23.952s 31 laps