Mark Sutton/Motorsport Images
Leclerc leads Albon in rain-disrupted final British GP practice
Charles Leclerc beat Alex Albon to the top spot in the third practice session at the British Grand Prix, shortly before rain doused the track and curtailed the pursuit of competitive times.
FP3 started dry, but rain had been sprinkling Silverstone for much of the day, and teams estimated they had a roughly 25-minute window before the weather closed in on the circuit once more. Most drivers therefore got their soft-tire run done early to ensure they got their eye in ahead of qualifying later today in the event of a dry session.
Leclerc, who missed all FP2 with an electronics problem that required his mechanics to break the overnight curfew to undertake repairs, was out of pit lane early and rocketed straight to the top of the time sheet with a 1m27.419s, the fastest lap of the weekend so far.
The Monegasque was unsurprisingly also the most prolific lap-getter of the session, accumulating 24 tours of the track to make up for lost time on Saturday. The only blemish on his record was taking slightly too much curb on his final lap and pirouetting in the wet weather, luckily harmlessly.
He was kept company at the top of the order by Albon, who completed a sweep of practice sessions embedded inside the top three in his ordinarily lowly Williams car. He was just 0.173s slower that Leclerc.
Fernando Alonso completed the top three for Aston Martin 0.365s off the pace.
Red Bull Racing teammates Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez never troubled the top of the order, with neither sampling the soft rubber before the arrival of the rain, leaving them eighth and 14th respectively.
Their absence opened the door to Pierre Gasly to take fourth for Alpine ahead of Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes in fifth.
Carlos Sainz was half a second adrift of his session-leading teammate but had his quickest lap partially obstructed by Alonso as the Aston driver started his own flyer.
Logan Sargeant was seventh in the second Williams car but had his session marred by a problem in the cockpit which the American said left his arms exposed to painful hot air, forcing him to pit for repairs.
Verstappen was eighth ahead of George Russell and AlphaTauri teammates Yuki Tsunoda and Nyck de Vries.
Lando Norris was 12th but will be investigated after the session for stopping at the end of the pit lane at the beginning of the session with a device lodged in his exhaust. A team member ran to meet the stopped car to extract the piece of equipment and appeared to leave the pit lane boundary, which the stewards noted for inquiry almost immediately.
Lance Stroll was 13th ahead of Perez, Kevin Magnussen, Esteban Ocon, Oscar Piastri, Valtteri Bottas and Nico Hulkenberg.
Zhou Guanyu set only two untimed laps for the session due to a problem with his Alfa Romeo’s MGU-H problem not charging the battery, leaving him on the back foot for qualifying.
Presented by:
Michael Lamonato
Having first joined the F1 press corps in 2012 by what he assumed was administrative error, Michael has since made himself one of the few Australian regulars in the press room. Graduating in print journalism and later radio, he worked his way from community media to Australia's ABC Grandstand as an F1 broadcaster, and his voice is now heard on the official Australian Grand Prix podcast, the F1 Strategy Report and Box of Neutrals. Though he'd prefer to be recognized for his F1 expertise, in parts of hometown Melbourne his reputation for once being sick in a kart will forever precede him.
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