Lewis Hamilton is starting to believe McLaren could have a car to seriously challenge for Formula One honours this season.
Hamilton enjoyed a second highly-productive day at the wheel of the MP4-27 at Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya in the second pre -season test.
After completing 114 laps on day one, the 27-year-old rattled off a high of 120 laps on Wednesday, and although only sixth on the timesheet, McLaren's long-run pace is catching the eye.
With a full race simulation behind him, Hamilton said: "To have completed more than 1000 kilometres in the past two days is incredibly encouraging. The whole team should feel proud.
"The car behaves really well in the high-speed corners. I think the baseline of our car is higher than it was last year, and it's better overall at high speed.
"It's been an extremely productive few days, and I think Jenson (Button) will continue to improve the car tomorrow.
"Now I'm just looking forward to the final test (in Barcelona from March 1-4). It's where you get a really good feeling of where the car will be.
"It's also exciting because it's the last stop before the first race."
Force India's Nico Hulkenberg was quickest on Wednesday with a lap of one minute 22.608secs, 1.198secs ahead of Hamilton.
The German finished 0.040secs up on Sauber's Sergio Perez, although both times were set on the significantly quicker Pirelli supersoft tyre.
Reigning double world champion Sebastian Vettel, was a quarter of a second adrift in his Red Bull, and on the soft tyre.
However, like Hamilton the 24-year-old managed to complete a full race simulation in the afternoon, leaving him to declare he is "on the right road".
Ferrari's Fernando Alonso was just over a second down, followed by the Toro Rosso of Daniel Ricciardo, although his lap was again on the supersofts.
After a technical issue on Tuesday, the Australian twice brought out the red flag on day two for stopping on track, the second of which was for a driveshaft problem.
Sitting in Mercedes' W03 for the first time in official testing, Nico Rosberg finished the day down in seventh, almost two seconds adrift, with Williams' tester Valtteri Bottas 3.130secs adrift in eighth.
Vitaly Petrov, meanwhile, enjoyed a "pretty positive" debut for Caterham as he set about acclimatising himself to his new car and team.
Petrov was only signed up on Friday, replacing Jarno Trulli after being released by Renault - now Lotus this year - at the end of last season.
The Russian's height and weight, in contrast to the smaller and lighter Trulli, are understood to have caused a few minor issues.
However, Petrov managed to complete 69 laps, finishing just under four seconds down on Hulkenberg for ninth on the timesheet.
"We had a couple of issues with the seating position and the brakes, but you expect that from a new car and they were little things we were able to fix quickly," said Petrov.
"Physically I feel really good. It's obviously been a while since I've been in a car, but I've kept up my fitness levels and I enjoyed myself on track, so it's a good first day back."
Petrov, however, feels a change in his driving style is necessary, adding: "One thing I have noticed is this car behaves a little differently from my previous experience.
"I've been quite aggressive before, but I think this car responds better to smoother inputs, so that's something I can work on."
As on the opening day, Marussia's Charles Pic brought up the rear, albeit in last year's car as the team are not due to unveil their latest challenger until next Thursday at the start of the final test.
