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's red machines looked consistently impressive and topped the timesheets for three days. That will please the Italian team immensely after they endured their worse start to a season in nearly 30 years in 2009.

New recruit clocked the fastest time of the test on its final day as he scorched round Valencia's Ricardo Tormo track in one minute 11.470 seconds, to eclipse Ferrari team-mate 's best mark of 1:11.722 by 0.252 seconds.

Alonso's best lap was set during a period when he was running with low fuel levels - but not low enough to take anything away from his pace.

Given the brilliant Spaniard's fiery determination to win a third world championship title now he has finally arrived at Ferrari, his immediate pace looks potentially ominous for those trying to stop him.

Ferrari will also have been encouraged by Massa's performance.

Six months on from his horrific crash at the Hungarian Grand Prix, when he fractured his skull and narrowly avoided permanent damage to his left eye, the Brazilian racked up a massive 226 laps over two days.

On Monday, when the track was still 'green' - dirty and without any rubber laid down to increase grip - Massa strung 10 laps together and nailed 1:13 on every single one, suggesting early on that Ferrari had genuine pace.

Ferrari appeared to be running with average 2009 fuel loads on Monday - as were most teams - so they could gather a baseline of data to compare last season's car with their 2010 version.
Alonso made an impressive debut for Ferrari in Valencia

Things became even more interesting over the last two days when teams began experimenting with the amount of fuel on board in preparation for 2010's rule changes.

The during races means the teams must learn how to eke out maximum performance from a car loaded to the hilt with fuel at the same time as developing pure pace with light fuel on board for the qualifying shoot-out that defines grid positions - as well as managing the transition between the two during the race.

On Tuesday, McLaren's strung together a 24-lap run and set his fastest lap of 1:12.256 during the middle of that spell.

That is revealing because Hamilton would have needed enough fuel on board to stay out for that distance. So to set a fastest time when he was carrying a not insignificant amount of fuel shows the McLaren, like the Ferrari, is in good shape.

On the face of it, 's performance on Wednesday was not one you would expect from the reigning world champion. He finished fifth in the timesheets, 0.695 seconds adrift of team-mate Hamilton's best time - and nearly 1.5secs slower than Alonso.

However, his times suggest the 30-year-old was running within a medium fuel load, making super- fast times less likely, and given he has only had a month with McLaren compared to Hamilton's decade, Button should be satisfied.

Button's former boss, team principal Ross Brawn, has already admitted that his team are slightly behind Ferrari and McLaren.

"We are reasonable but not as quick as Ferrari," Brawn surmised. "Lewis (Hamilton) looked quick, so it looks like we've got a bit of work to do.

"On full tanks we were the same pace as the Ferraris but on low fuel they were quicker. That's slightly strange but it may be the issues we have with the car, which we can fix for (the next test in) Jerez."

The encouraging news for Mercedes is that their new driver line-up of and the returning seven-time world champion appears to be settling in nicely.

Schumacher, 41, got up to pace after just 20 laps, which is testament to his natural talent after three years out of the cockpit.

The best time set by Schumacher over his day and a half in the cockpit of 1:12.438 was more than 0.4 seconds faster than Rosberg's best - 1m12.899.

The Mercedes team-mates were running similar programmes in Valencia and, although Schumacher was slightly faster than Rosberg, they were both consistent over long runs.

Overall, Ferrari and McLaren showed early signs of being back to their best in the build-up to 2010 with Mercedes, who hold the constructors' title in their former guise of Brawn, just behind.

With the trio heading the seven-strong field in terms of pace, Sauber and Renault appeared to be early contenders for best of the rest.

Sauber rocketed up the timesheets as between them and finished runners-up to Ferrari on all three days of the test.

The Swiss-based team are certainly showing signs of competitiveness but their times are tempered by the fact that they were not set during longer runs on the track, which could mean they had less fuel on board.

, on the other hand, signalled their competitiveness when lead driver set out on Tuesday for a long run with heavy fuel on board while still managing to bang out consistent times.

Williams also put and Nico Hulkenberg, newly-promoted from reserve driver to the race seat, through their paces by sending them out for lengthy stints on the track.

Remarkably, Barrichello notched up 256 miles on Tuesday. A normal race distance is around 190 miles - no wonder the 37-year-old looked shattered.

The teams will be joined by , who ended the 2009 season as the fastest team on the track, for next week's second test in Jerez.

If Valencia is a sign of things to come, the 2010 season could be very close indeed.