Motorsport journalist and podcaster
Max Verstappen led the FP3 time sheet after a quiet final hour of practice ahead of qualifying for the Bahrain Grand Prix.
The Dutchman broke Lewis Hamilton’s Friday practice streak with a time of 1m28.355s, the fastest lap of the weekend so far. He did so despite his Red Bull RB16 appearing to suffer from rear wing instability while using DRS, a problem his mechanics will seek to rectify in the two-hour break before qualifying.
Notwithstanding the problem, Verstappen’s time was enough to beat Hamilton to top spot by 0.263s.
Continue reading on RACERLewis Hamilton ended Friday practice at the Bahrain Grand Prix as the fastest man in a night session interrupted by red flags for an Alex Albon crash.
Hamilton lowered his pre-sunset benchmark by less than a tenth to 1m28.971s with lap on fresh softs in the final 15 minutes. It was enough to beat Max Verstappen to top spot by 0.347s, although the Dutchman’s best lap was logged on medium tires after he had been unable make gains on the softs.
Valtteri Bottas was third, 0.018s behind Verstappen on his own soft tire run early in the evening.
Continue reading on RACERLewis Hamilton set the fastest time of opening practice at the Bahrain Grand Prix ahead of Mercedes teammate Valtteri Bottas. The champion-elect’s best time of 1m29.033s was 0.449s quicker than Bottas and almost a full second ahead of the next-best car, Sergio Perez’s Racing Point.
The Mexican is leading the way in the battle for fourth in the drivers standings and forging a path for Racing Point, which heads the midfield in the battle for third.
Midfield rival Carlos Sainz was just 0.18s further back for McLaren, the two teams split by only six points.
Continue reading on RACERI preview the upcoming Australian and Bahrain grands prix with last year’s podcast guests Peter Anderson from theredline.com.au and Rodney Gordon from Superlicense F1 Podcast.
Lewis Hamilton has equalled Michael Schumacher’s seven-title record with one of his all-time great drives.