Red Bull's Max Verstappen at Free Practice 3 but Mercedes much improved at Bahrain Grand Prix
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Updated 19/03/2022 at 21:28 GMT
Last season's champion Max Verstappen appears to have hit his stride already. He was fastest in Friday's second practice session, but put down the fastest time on Saturday ahead of today's qualifying. The Red Bull driver was followed by Charles Leclerc in second, and then the Dutchman's teammate came in at third.
‘We had to take the opportunity’ - Leclerc claims pole in Bahrain, Verstappen second
Max Verstappen was fastest in Free Practice 3 at the Bahrain Grand Prix on Saturday.
With qualification to come later in the day, this was the last chance for teams to test their setups before they were thrown into the first competitive action of the 2022 season.
The Dutch world champion was the fastest in yesterday’s second session, and he continued his dominance from Friday - and 2021 - with a time of 1:32.544.
He was, however, only a fraction a second behind Ferrari’s Monegasque driver Charles Leclerc, who trailed by 0.096s, and who earlier span his car on turn 11 after doing the same yesterday.
Vertsappens’ teammate Sergio Perez was third fastest, then came George Russell, Carlos Sainz and Lewis Hamilton, meaning the front six spaces were shared by the same three teams.
It made for a much improved display for Mercedes, who had struggled with porpoising for much of the pre-season.
However, Russell admitted during the session that he was, “Still not feeling massively comfortable with the car. So much understeer at low speed."
Qualifying is still to come as teams compete for tomorrow’s running order for Sunday’s race.
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