Lando Norris beat teammate Oscar Piastri to top spot in final practice for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix in a foreboding demonstration of pace by McLaren to go more than 0.6s quicker than any other team.
Despite FP3 taking place in the late afternoon, with the track temperature an unrepresentative 115 degrees F, Norris got surprisingly close to beating last year’s pole time.
His benchmark of 1m 27.489s was just 0.017s slower than Max Verstappen’s pole-getting best in 2024 and only 0.024s faster than teammate Piastri.
Piastri had seemed set to end the final practice session at the top of the order after the final run on fresh softs, but Norris squeezed an extra 0.182s from his used rubber to move from second to first off the back of an impressive purple final sector.
The Australian attempted to respond on his used tires but aborted the effort after a wobble put him off line and spoiled the lap.
George Russell followed in third, but the Mercedes driver was 0.627s slower than Norris. The rest of the top 10 is spread over a smaller gap.
Max Verstappen moved up to fourth with a last-gasp lap on old tires that put him 0.845s off the pace after another session beset by niggles, this time including engine braking.
He displaced Charles Leclerc who dropped to fifth just 0.038s further back.
The Monegasque commented over radio at the end of the session that he felt that was the maximum from the Ferrari in these warm conditions.
Williams teammates Alex Albon and Carlos Sainz were 0.9s and 1.081s off the pace respectively but secured top midfield honors for the team ahead of Alpine’s Pierre Gasly, who was 1.136 slower than Norris’s benchmark.
Repairs to Yuki Tsunoda’s car after his late crash in FP2 yesterday were ongoing until almost halfway through the session, the Japanese driver thanking the team for its work as he joined the session with around 35 minutes still on the clock.
Andrea Kimi Antonelli completed the top 10 for Mercedes.
Isack Hadjar battled a water bottle problem on his way to 11th ahead of a despondent Lewis Hamilton, who sounded in equal parts mystified and defeated by his 0.408s gap to teammate Leclerc and 1.291s deficit to top spot.
Liam Lawson was 13th ahead of Fernando Alonso and Jack Doohan, who will see the stewards later in the day for crossing the white pit lane entry line early in the session.
Oliver Bearman was 16th ahead of Nico Hulkenberg and Esteban Ocon.
Gabriel Bortoleto missed FP2 with a fuel leak, costing him the only session run in representative conditions.
The Brazilian completed a session-high 24 laps in a bid to make up for lost running, putting him ahead of only Lance Stroll at the bottom of the pile.
