Third Free Practice Results 2021 Qatar F1 GP

Event: Qatar F1 Grand Prix
Track: Losail International Circuit

Lewis Hamilton driving into the pits at Losail circuit during practice for the 2018 Qatar F1 GP.

Weather: dry 37.6°C
Tarmac: dry 37.7°C
Humidity: 57.7%
Wind: 0.5 m/s S
Pressure: 1009.2 bar

At the start of the third and final practice before qualifying and the race at Qatar, Nikita Mazepin again had a problem. The Russian driver already had to sit out FP2, because the team had to rebuild the car after the chassis got damaged during yesterday's FP1. This time Mazepin drove on to the track, when the engine didn't sound right and he stopped the car at the end of the pitlane. The session got red flagged, to let the Haas team mechanics push back the car towards their garage and fix the problem.

The other Haas driver Mick Schumacher was able to enter the track and was the first to do so. In the beginning of the session the Red Bull Racing team was still working on both cars. A line of mechanics was standing in front of the cars to keep, what they were working on secret. Esteban Ocon was the first driver to put a lap time on the timesheets. The Alpine driver did a lap of Losail in 1:24.864 min on the medium tyres.

After 15 minutes, only two driver had set a lap time. This was the moment when Lewis Hamilton got out the Mercedes garage on soft tyres. The British driver started his session with a practice start. His teammate Valtteri Bottas also had started the session. The Finnish driver who also was on softs did his first timed lap in 1:24.019. Hamilton's first lap was a 1:23.950 min, which was the fastest lap time up till now.

A few moments later Fernando Alonso took over P1 on medium tyres with a 1:123.904. Bottas then again pushed a bit more and got P1 back being 0.517s quicker than Alonso on the softs again, while Red Bull driver Max Verstappen was still in the Red Bull garage. One minutes after Bottas his teammate Hamilton put a bit more effort and went 0.2s faster than Bottas with a 1:23.152.

Halfway the session Max Verstappen also had entered the Losail track on soft tyres and beat both Mercedes drivers on his first attempted by a small margin of only 0.031s. Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz now also had improved on the soft tyres and even was faster than Bottas on P3, only 0.2s behind Hamilton.

With 25 minutes to go Hamilton and Bottas again improved by 0.5s to go fastest. Bottas put in a 1:22.573 and was 0.082s quicker than Hamilton who was on P2. Verstappen now was 3rd looking at a 'major' 0.4s gap towards the Mercedes' drivers. Mazepin's car still wasn't fixed at that time.

With 12 minutes to go Charles Leclerc caused yellow flags when he spun the Ferrari, while he was pushing a lot and spun at turn 2. The Monegasque driver was 6th on +0.888s to Hamilton who now was fastest with a 1:22.388 min. Bottas now was quickest in the first sector, Hamilton in the second sector and Leclerc in the third.

With 8 minutes to go Hamilton got back to the Mercedes pits to get a new front wing. At that time Verstappen only had driven 6 laps.

FP3 Times Table 2021 Qatar GP

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