Step one, design. Step two, build. Step three ...Test. There are few more important moments for an F1 team than when their challenger takes to the track for the very first time.

The first of the pre-season tests was run at the Jerez circuit in Spain over the last week. Despite the age-old warning that not too much should be read into the relative performances during the tests, some important pieces of information that form part of the 2012 puzzle, were revealed.

Ferrari’s on-track performance didn’t quite live up to expectation if the likes of Felipe Massa and technical director Pat Fry are to be believed. The latter revealed that the F2012 suffered no major reliability issues throughout the test. Yet, he emphasized that the team would have to work hard to improve car performance which Fry rated as just ‘okay.’

While the Ferrari brains trust opted for a cautious outlook, Fernando Alonso has promised that the team will arrive at the second pre-season test in Barcelona in much better shape.

McLaren had a trouble-free test session and both Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button were playing their cards close to their chest. The MP4-27’s lap times hovered around the midfield region on the timing sheets. Like most other drivers, Hamilton peddled caution to what he described as a ‘positive start’ to the season.

Though he was coy about the performance of the new McLaren, he did reveal that they were ‘aggressive’ with the fuel loads; suggesting that the team had run the car on low fuel for some part of the testing session.

While most of the 2012 challengers are evolutions of their 2011 counterparts, there are some aspects that teams will have to focus their attention on. The ban of the rear blown diffuser, and subsequent loss of rear downforce, is a particular area where teams such as McLaren are trying to claw back the deficit.

Despite being focused on his task of putting the MP4-27 through its paces, Hamilton was nevertheless keeping a close eye on his prospective competitors. “I think you can see the Red Bull looks quick. The Lotus looks quite impressive,” he said.

Creating that impression, was returning world champion Kimi Raikkonen. Two years of participation in the World Rally Championship seemed like nothing more than an interlude to the Finn’s F1 career.

Despite setting the fastest overall time on day one, the ’07 champ dismissed the meaningless lap times. “It makes no difference,” he said. “The feeling is pretty OK with the car and for sure I’ve had much worse first days and worse feelings with new cars,” he added. “I was quite happy with it.” Raikkonen completed 192 laps in total in the E20.

Newly-signed Bruno Senna rolled out Williams’s FW34 and while no flashy lap time was recorded, the Brazilian did share a good impression of the new car. After their worst season ever in F1 the Grove-based team will be hoping to bounce back with several changes in personnel and Renault engine power.

At the other end of the pecking order, Red Bull’s double world champion, Sebastian Vettel, chose to reserve judgment on the RB8. The German, baying for three consecutive titles, pointed out that there was still a lot of work to be done in the Red Bull garage before the season’s first race. He speculated that the race for title glory may be as tight as it was in 2011. If, by his own admission, 2011 was a tight season for the record-breaking champion, what will he be capable of in an ‘easy’ year?