Red Bull had another disastrous day's testing in Bahrain, as they slumped to just 14 laps completed on day one in the Middle East, with Force India's returning star Nico Hulkenburg going quickest.
The constructors' world champions were delayed by five hours due to more mechanical issues which have plagued their pre-season testing, and - when eventually out on track - the car broke down with over an hour remaining.
It was the familiar sight of the RB-10 being towed back to the pits rather than cantering along as in the 2013 season, where Sebastian Vettel went largely unchallenged in his march to a fourth consecutive world drivers' championship title.
And the German was left frustrated on day one in Bahrain, just as last month in Jerez.
He said: "Obviously we're not happy with where we are right now but we still have a long way ahead of us.
"It's difficult to judge where we are. I haven't had much of the car yet. The first gut feeling is OK but we need more to judge the car. It is not that easy to find a quick fix. I think we understand the problems but it's not easy to find a solution.
"We had a problem with temperature in Jerez which we seemed to fix, at least with the couple of laps we could do. But very often you fix one problem and another one pops up."
Renault arrived in Bahrain admitting it had not completely solved the problems that had made the first test a waste of time for all their teams.
The Renault-powered Red Bull, Toro Rosso, Caterham and Lotus cars were able to do more laps than the French manufacturer managed at the first test, but they are still being afflicted by some problems, and Lotus in particular toiled in their first public test of the season.
They completed only seven laps, with only Caterham able to get decent mileage in, completing 58 laps.
Force India's Hulkenburg led the way in pace, ahead of Ferrari's Fernando Alonso and Mercedes' Lewis Hamilton, as McLaren's Kevin Magnussen was fourth quickest from Vettel, who was 3.344secs off the pace.
It is still early days for the Austrian team, but there appears to be a long road ahead if they are going to be fighting fit in Australia on March 18th.