Carlos Sainz Jr of Ferrari emerged as the leader in the third and final practice session for the Bahrain Grand Prix, with Fernando Alonso of Aston Martin following closely behind, creating a Spanish one-two. The session, which took place during the daytime, had significantly different track temperatures compared to the expected conditions for qualifying later in the day. Lewis Hamilton, who was the fastest in the previous session, initially set the benchmark time of 1:32.733s using soft tires. Sainz and Charles Leclerc of Ferrari then joined the track and posted times close to Hamilton’s. Alonso eventually claimed the top spot halfway through the session with a time of 1:31.582s. Red Bull took a different approach by using hard tires, and Max Verstappen ended up 1.4s behind Alonso’s time. Towards the end of the session, Red Bull switched to soft tires, and Verstappen managed to secure the fastest lap time, with Sergio Perez also performing well. However, Sainz ultimately set the fastest time of 1:30.824s, with Alonso in second place, 0.141s behind, and Verstappen in third, 0.238s behind Sainz.
Ferrari has announced that Charles Leclerc will have a new race engineer for the upcoming Emilia Romagna Grand Prix. Xavi Marcos, who has been Leclerc's engineer since 2019,...
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