Free Practice 3 – Massa shines, Toyota drivers follow

Felipe Massa, driving his F60, sets the fastest time in the third practice session at the Turkish Grand Prix. On the Istanbul Park circuit, he is the only one to go under the 1 minute 28 second mark. His closest challengers are Toyota drivers Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock, who follow him closely.

Felipe Massa implies that he could be in a position to secure pole position and victory in Turkey for the fourth consecutive year.

The Ferrari driver was the fastest in the majority of the session. Only Nico Rosberg (Williams) and Rubens Barrichello (Brawn GP) displaced him from the top spot a short time after the beginning of the session.

The Brazilian was then the first to try the soft tires while enjoying a clear track for his flying lap. However, he was unable to improve his time achieved with the hard tires.

Massa is not the only driver to find that Bridgestone’s soft tires offer few advantages. The times have therefore remained relatively stable.

But some drivers go against this observation, notably the Toyota duo, Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock, who leap to second and third place. They are respectively 0.039 and 0.111 seconds behind Massa. Glock went straight off at turn 1, without damage, after completing his fast lap.

Kazuki Nakajima (Williams) and Robert Kubica (BMW Sauber) also take advantage to enter the top five.

The drivers of the championship-leading team, Brawn GP, were pushed back to sixth and seventh place, with Barrichello first and then Jenson Button. They secured these positions in the final minutes.

Rosberg, Kimi Räikkönen (Ferrari), who made a slight error at turn 2 during his last lap, and Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull secure the last spots in the top 10 in what was once again a very tight session. To illustrate, the entire field is within 1.4 seconds, with only half a second separating the first and the tenth.

Piquet (Renault) is 11th while the McLaren drivers disappoint, Lewis Hamilton is 12th and his teammate, the Finn Heikki Kovalainen is 15th. They are separated by Mark Webber (Red Bull) and Nick Heidfeld (BMW). As usual since the start of the weekend, Force India and Toro Rosso share the bottom of the standings. The only exception, Fernando Alonso for Renault is in 19th place.

Free Practice 3 Results – Turkish GP – Saturday, June 6, 2009: