Lewis Hamilton quickest again in final Abu Dhabi practice

New double world champion Sebastian Vettel was second fastest ahead of his Red Bull team-mate Mark Webber, with McLaren's Jenson Button in fourth.

Fernando Alonso has a quiet session on his way to fifth position for Ferrari, ahead of Mercedes' Nico Rosberg. Felipe Massa (Ferrari), Force India duo Adrian Sutil, Paul di Resta and Michael Schumacher (Mercedes) completed the top 10.

Sauber and Force India appeared to carry their battle for sixth place in the constructors' championship over to final practice in the first 15 minutes of the session as Sergio Perez and di Resta traded times at the top of the chart initially.

That continued only until Massa emerged from the pits to go fastest with a 1m43.132s lap in the Ferrari.

The Brazilian remained on top for about five minutes, then Button lowered the mark by a second with a lap of 1m42.162s, just around the same time as Hamilton and Schumacher appeared to squabble over an apex - forcing the Mercedes driver over the run-off.

Hamilton was quickly over that domestic however and challenging his team-mate at the top of the pile. But as Hamilton closed to within a tenth, so Button extended the gap again with a 1m40.993s.

Red Bull had a slow start to the session and it was not until halfway through that Vettel and Webber slotted in to third and fourth positions. The Australian was not finished however, and his next lap through brought him to within 0.002s of Button.

As if to prove how close things were, Vettel then worked down to a 1m40.938s which meant that the top three were covered by 0.06s at that point.

Hamilton was having none of that and produced a 1m40.631s with 20 minutes to go, as the balance of power swung back and forth between Red Bull and McLaren.

And then, as if from nowhere, Massa was back in the picture as he switched to the soft option tyres - setting an identical time to the thousandth as Hamilton. Just as Rosberg, also on the options, split Hamilton and Vettel to go third in the Mercedes.

Rosberg followed his quick run with a cool-down lap. But the one after that saw the German go quickest overall with a 1m40.135s lap - just 0.048s faster than Massa's own improvement following a similar strategy - perhaps a hint of what is to come in qualifying.

And so to the final five minutes and the now traditional period of qualifying simulation runs. And Webber was the first to show his hand with a 1m39.668s, followed by Vettel moments later, though the world champion was 0.063s slower than his team-mate.

Then Hamilton proved McLaren has indeed got some prodigious pace this weekend as he fired in an impressive 1m39.177s lap. Webber might have matched that but came across his own team-mate warming his tyres in the final sector.

Hamilton then improved further to lower the mark for a final time with a 1m38.976s, and neither Vettel - who improved to second - nor Webber could match that.

Pos  Driver              Team/Car              Time       Gap       Laps
 1.  Lewis Hamilton      McLaren-Mercedes      1m38.976s            17
 2.  Sebastian Vettel    Red Bull-Renault      1m39.403s  + 0.427s  18
 3.  Mark Webber         Red Bull-Renault      1m39.427s  + 0.451s  18
 4.  Jenson Button       McLaren-Mercedes      1m39.429s  + 0.453s  16
 5.  Fernando Alonso     Ferrari               1m39.661s  + 0.685s  16
 6.  Nico Rosberg        Mercedes              1m40.135s  + 1.159s  19
 7.  Felipe Massa        Ferrari               1m40.183s  + 1.207s  18
 8.  Adrian Sutil        Force India-Mercedes  1m40.429s  + 1.453s  21
 9.  Paul di Resta       Force India-Mercedes  1m40.511s  + 1.535s  19
10.  Michael Schumacher  Mercedes              1m40.938s  + 1.962s  18
11.  Bruno Senna         Renault               1m41.509s  + 2.533s  21
12.  Kamui Kobayashi     Sauber-Ferrari        1m41.527s  + 2.551s  21
13.  Sergio Perez        Sauber-Ferrari        1m41.566s  + 2.590s  20
14.  Vitaly Petrov       Renault               1m41.594s  + 2.618s  18
15.  Sebastien Buemi     Toro Rosso-Ferrari    1m41.622s  + 2.646s  18
16.  Jaime Alguersuari   Toro Rosso-Ferrari    1m41.855s  + 2.879s  18
17.  Pastor Maldonado    Williams-Cosworth     1m42.025s  + 3.049s  19
18.  Heikki Kovalainen   Lotus-Renault         1m43.409s  + 4.433s  22
19.  Rubens Barrichello  Williams-Cosworth     1m43.861s  + 4.885s  5
20.  Timo Glock          Virgin-Cosworth       1m45.262s  + 6.286s  23
21.  Tonio Liuzzi        HRT-Cosworth          1m45.302s  + 6.326s  20
22.  Jerome D'Ambrosio   Virgin-Cosworth       1m45.509s  + 6.533s  22
23.  Daniel Ricciardo    HRT-Cosworth          1m45.732s  + 6.756s  20
24.  Jarno Trulli        Lotus-Renault                              1

All timing unofficial