Formula One's first day of pre-season testing began in Valencia this morning to kick off 15 days of track action ahead of the first race of the 2010 season in Bahrain on 14 March.

Ferrari, BMW Sauber, Mercedes GP, McLaren Mercedes, Williams, Scuderia Toro Rosso and Renault were the seven teams that took to the track.

On day 1, with the two major attractions being Michael Schumacher in the new Silver Arrows and the return to the track of Felipe Massa in the Scarlet Ferrari, following his horrific accident at Hungary last season.

nico_rosberg2.jpgWell, it was Massa who just about nicked the headlines from the former Ferrari man, posting the quickest time of the day a 1:12.574.

Schumacher wasn't too far behind though, under half a second off the pace with a 1:12.947. In between Massa and Schumacher was an excellent Pedro de la Rosa posting a 1:12.784 lap.With no real indication of the fuel on board each car when these super fast laps were set, it might be a little premature to classify one car genuinely quicker than the other, however, with refuelling banned during the winter testing, one can safely assume that most cars would have run their tanks pretty empty by the end of the day.

Nico was the first to drive the new Silver Arrow on track with the main focus of his programme to work through the initial set-up of the car and ensure that he was comfortable with his seat and position. Nico drove out of the garage for his first installation run at 10:34 and completed five runs over 39 laps before he finished for the day at 13:40, setting the fourth fastest time - a 01:13.543.

Michael took over the MGP W01 for the remainder of the day for his first run in a current Formula One car since April 2008. Getting out on track just after 15:30, Michael was comfortably on the pace after his first run and spent the remaining track time familiarising himself with the new car. Michael completed 40 laps over three runs, with a fastest lap of 01:12.947 putting him in third place on the timesheets.

Nico will continue the team’s programme tomorrow with Michael taking over for the final day.

Rosberg was happy with his first outing in the car: “It was a good first day of testing for us and my initial impressions of the new car are very positive. It felt great to be in the car for the first time and to get our pre-season testing programme underway. Generally everything felt good although I was sitting too low in the car and couldn’t see the track very well which we will improve for tomorrow. It’s too early to get an initial impression of the competitiveness but it was very special to drive the new Silver Arrow out of the garage. I’m looking forward to tomorrow when we have a full day of testing to make further progress.”

Michael Schumacher brought some nostalgia to his press briefing at the end of the day, reminding everyone how long he has been involved in the sport. The living legend said, “It was a perfect rollout for the new car today. I felt totally comfortable and really had a feeling that everything was very natural. It felt just like at the very beginning of my career in 1991 when on the first lap, I thought ‘wow that was really fast’ and then on the second lap, I was just extremely excited. I feel like a young boy again and really enjoyed myself out there. We did a good job today, just making a few control checks, and the most important thing was that the car ran reliably. With Nico and I covering 79 laps between us, it was a superb job by the team.”

Schumacher's ex-teammate Rubens Barrichello had an interesting day and was able to put 75 laps under his belt. He did have some minor software issue with the throttle control towards the end of the session, but would be delighted that his brand new Cosworth engine survived day 1 without any worries.  Barrichello said, "I enjoyed today, it was like a first day at school! You can't predict anything from the times today; and probably won't be able to for the remainder of the tests because of the fuel loads people will run with such big tanks. It probably won't be until Bahrain qualifying that we will see where everyone is. We are working on improving the balance of the car, but it's running reliably, despite the small issue with the throttle. As everything is new, it was a good day."

Massa on the other hand put down an amazing 103 laps testing given the Ferrari an awesome run out.

Gary Paffett, the reserve driver for the McLaren Mercedes team had an exciting day mixing it up for 86 laps with the stars.McLaren started their day's programme with a number of short five-lap runs while in the afternoon, the team conducted some longer runs, looking at a greater variety of set-up configurations. Gary declared himself happy with the car's balance and handling.

The action heats up tomorrow with former world champion Lewis Hamilton getting into the hot seat of the MP4-25.