Abu Dhabi Grand Prix – Free Practice 3: George Russell finds the trick, Max Verstappen struggling

The time for the final practice session of this season has come, at 11:30, this Saturday morning. The first session yesterday was dominated by 10 young drivers behind the wheel. The regular drivers were able to return to their cars in FP2 yesterday afternoon, so this FP3 was crucial for fine-tuning the cars ahead of the qualifying session this afternoon, to be followed from 14:40.

George Russell had set the fastest time in FP1, Charles Leclerc in FP2. The Ferraris seemed quite comfortable, especially on the long straights of the circuit, reaching a top speed of 333 km/h for Charles Leclerc! However, Carlos Sainz encountered some troubles with a crash at turn 3.

A flying start

Lewis Hamilton kicked off the session with his foot on the accelerator, using soft tires from the start! He set the first benchmark time in 1:26.612. However, his time was quickly beaten by Carlos Sainz: 1:26.609 on medium tires, no less.

The start of the session was very fast, with all the cars coming out of the pits doing timed laps or nearly so. The positions were constantly changing, with almost all the drivers using the red tires.

Sergio Perez took the lead in the timesheet after 10 minutes of the session, with a time of 1:25.417 on soft tires, leaving the second place, Pierre Gasly, almost a second behind.

5 minutes later, George Russell replied, improving Sergio Perez’s time by 2 and a half tenths.

Max Verstappen then complained about his rear end, while he was in 3rd place and therefore behind his teammate.

After 20 minutes of downtime, the pace of the session dropped slightly. Yuki Tsunoda and Daniel Ricciardo finally set off, they were the only team that had not yet set a time. Ferrari was the only team that had not put on the soft tires.

George Russell improved his time, dominating the times in the third sector. The Mercedes is heavily loaded aerodynamically, which gives it an advantage in the very twisty third sector, at the expense of their top speed. It should be noted that George Russell’s Mercedes was probably carrying less fuel than the other cars. This would explain his excellent performance in the third sector and the gap with Lewis Hamilton, who was over a second behind.

At the halfway point, Max Verstappen was second behind Russell by over five tenths. Oscar Piastri completed the top three. The Aston Martins seemed comfortable, in 5th and 6th positions. Just outside the top ten were Williams, AlphaTauri, and Alpine fighting for position.

A slower-paced second half of the session

Williams climbed back up the hierarchy with 20 minutes left in the session by setting the 2nd and 4th fastest times. Alex Albon was only a tenth behind George Russell before the latter improved his lap time once again.

Lando Norris treated us to a beautiful skid in the final corner, artistically setting the 2nd best time.

Max Verstappen fitted new soft tires, but he cut his effort even before the end of the lap. He seemed to be uncomfortable on this Yas Marina track. He was complaining about bouncing on his car.

Ferrari finally put on the soft tires, but Leclerc did not do better than 5th place, more than 6 tenths behind George Russell. Despite a very good first sector, the two Ferraris lost a lot of time in the last two sectors.

Moreover, the Monegasque praised on the radio the work done on the bumps at turn number 3, which caused Carlos Sainz’s accident yesterday.

The session ended with very small gaps: 16 cars were within one second of each other!

Note that this session took place during the day, unlike the qualifying and the Grand Prix where the temperature will be cooler. The hierarchy of this session could be disrupted as early as this afternoon.

The session ranking