Sebastian Vettel shrugged off the significance of his stunning lap time from testing on Thursday, calling on Ferrari to find more performance from the SF71H.

The four-time world champion smashed the unofficial lap record set by Daniel Ricciardo on Wednesday by almost nine-tenths of a second, posting the first ever 1m17s lap of the current Barcelona layout.

Though that caught the attention of many, Vettel insists there is very little to read from his time and improvement is still needed.

“I think it’s the wrong conclusion to look at the time sheet – there’s more too it than a good lap," he said. “I think today the track was quite fast, we also ran a little bit different programme to others.

“We still need to work on the performance and the feeling. We did a lot of laps and that’s important in understanding the car, to know what we need.

“There are some things we still need to get on top of, so it was important to run.”

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One driver who noticed Ferrari's pace was world champion Lewis Hamilton and the Mercedes driver hoped Vettel's performance was a sign of things to come.

“I hope it is a good time because it means they are strong and we have a race on our hands,” he told Sky Sports. “I can’t wait for the first race to see where we all come out. We want people to be on the edge of their seats.”

The Briton did issue one note of warning, however, that the Brackley-based team is yet to really push the limit.

“We haven’t been on low fuel yet so l have no idea where the car can go yet,” he claimed.