» Hamilton leads Mercedes 1-2 in final practice

Lewis Hamilton has posted the fastest time in the final practice session of the Australian Grand Prix ahead of teammate Nico Rosberg and Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel.

Just 0.176 seconds separated the two Mercedes drivers, as both Hamilton and Rosberg ran the super soft tyre for the first time this year, having opted to not run the compound during pre-season testing.

FP3 saw the first session where the circuit was completely dry, which meant that drivers hurried out onto the circuit to make up for lost time on Friday.

For some the rush to get out was too intense, as Manor Racing’s Rio Haryanto ran into Romain Grosjean’s Haas while both were exiting their respective and adjacent pit garages. The incident left Grosjean in his garage for almost half of the one-hour session while the team worked on replacing the floor as a precaution.

Red Bull Racing focused on their qualifying simulations early on, running the super soft tyre while the rest of the field stayed on the slower soft compound, running presumably higher fuel loads some 2-3 seconds off the pace at minimum.

Daniel Ricciardo and teammate Daniil Kvyat traded places at the top of the table during their qualifying runs, but would have been a little disheartened to see Kimi Räikkönen’s Ferrari clear both of their times using the soft tyre, which is theoretically six-tenths of a second per lap slower.

The Australian bounced back and moved back to top spot by just over one-tenth of a second, albeit still on the super soft tyre.

Scuderia Toro Rosso enjoyed a trouble-free session for both drivers, with Carlos Sainz Jr and Max Verstappen both registering late laps on the super softs to finish the final practice session in fourth and sixth position respectively.

Despite reporting having big problems with his front tyres, Felipe Massa managed to keep his Williams in the top ten, although he was almost half a second down on his teammate Valtteri Bottas in seventh.

Both McLaren drivers were within a tenth of a second of being inside the top ten, with Fernando Alonso finishing in 11th while Jenson Button was a fraction behind in 12th.

The inaugural ‘knockout’ style qualifying session gets underway at 17:00 local time today (GMT +11).

2016 FORMULA 1 ROLEX AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX – FREE PRACTICE 3 RESULTS
	Driver	Team / Entry	Result	Laps
1.	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 W07 Hybrid	1:25.624	24
2.	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 W07 Hybrid	+ 0.176	25
3.	Sebastian Vettel	Scuderia Ferrari SF16-H	+ 0.228	25
4.	Carlos Sainz Jr	Scuderia Toro Rosso Ferrari STR11	+ 0.633	28
5.	Kimi Räikkönen	Scuderia Ferrari SF16-H	+ 0.811	23
6.	Max Verstappen	Scuderia Toro Rosso Ferrari STR11	+ 1.077	26
7.	Valtteri Bottas	Williams Martini Racing Mercedes FW38	+ 1.106	28
8.	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull Racing Tag Heuer RB12	+ 1.144	22
9.	Felipe Massa	Williams Martini Racing Mercedes FW38	+ 1.527	28
10.	Sergio Pérez	Sahara Force India Mercedes VJM09	+ 1.618	22
11.	Fernando Alonso	McLaren-Honda MP4-31	+ 1.639	20
12.	Jenson Button	McLaren-Honda MP4-31	+ 1.717	20
13.	Daniil Kvyat	Red Bull Racing Tag Heuer RB12	+ 1.806	22
14.	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber F1 Team Ferrari C35	+ 2.035	26
15.	Kevin Magnussen	Renault Sport F1 Team RS16	+ 2.247	24
16.	Nico Hülkenberg	Sahara Force India Mercedes VJM09	+ 2.364	22
17.	Jolyon Palmer	Renault Sport F1 Team RS16	+ 2.493	24
18.	Esteban Gutiérrez	Haas F1 Ferrari VF-16	+ 2.660	21
19.	Romain Grosjean	Haas F1 Ferrari VF-16	+ 2.668	11
20.	Felipe Nasr	Sauber F1 Team Ferrari C35	+ 2.669	26
21.	Pascal Wehrlein	Manor Racing Mercedes MRT5	+ 3.422	18
22.	Rio Haryanto	Manor Racing Mercedes MRT5	+ 3.648	23