Saturday’s action got underway with the third and final practice session of the weekend at the Bahrain International Circuit.
After impressing yesterday afternoon, Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso was the talk of the paddock as the team’s possible battle for pole created great excitement amongst Formula One fans.
Lewis Hamilton set the early pace in the session, with Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc sitting second and third after the opening twenty minutes of running.
Fernando Alonso then went fastest, with the Red Bulls on track with the hard tyres doing potential race simulations.
As we reached the halfway point it was Alonso, Hamilton, Sainz, Leclerc and Max Verstappen making up the top five on the leaderboard.
Despite nursing his injured wrist, Lance Stroll then went quickest with a quarter of an hour to go, showing just how much pace this Aston Martin car has and giving the a 1-2 going into the final part of the session.
When the clocked tick down to its final ten minutes, it was a Mercedes 1-2, with Hamilton leading his team-mate Russell. However, Verstappen took to the circuit for a flying lap and despite going slower than Hamilton in sector one, the rest of the lap was enough to claim top spot.
Fernando Alonso crossed the line seconds afterwards and went 0.005 seconds faster than his fellow two-time World Champion, with Sergio Perez climbing up to third place.
Here is how the top ten finished at the end of Free Practice Three in Bahrain:
Qualifying get’s underway this afternoon, with a 3 pm start for viewers watching in the UK. We will have coverage of the session here on The Apex Motorsport website and across our social media accounts.