Spanish GP F1 practice: Lewis Hamilton leads Mercedes 1-2 in FP3

Lewis Hamilton led a Mercedes one-two in final Spanish Grand Prix practice as Toro Rosso Formula 1 driver Brendon Hartley suffered a high-speed crash in the closing stages

Hartley brought the on-track action to a premature end after spinning his car into the barriers at the fast Turn 9 right-hander with a couple of minutes remaining.

That locked in Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas at the top of the order, a couple of tenths clear of Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel.

Mercedes held the top two positions for the first half of the session as Hamilton led Bottas by 0.029s on a 1m17.844s after their first runs on soft tyres.

That was enough to head the Ferraris at that stage despite Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen running supersofts, while Daniel Ricciardo went fifth on mediums as the three top teams diverged on tyre compounds.

Vettel and Raikkonen briefly established a Ferrari one-two after bolting on fresh supersofts, but when Mercedes switched to the same rubber its drivers moved back to the top.

Hamilton's 1m17.281s was enough to beat Bottas by 0.15s and lap just over a quarter of a second quicker than Vettel.

Bottas improved on the same set of supersofts to close to just 0.013s behind Hamilton, who went wide at Turn 1 and had time-consuming slides through Turn 13 and exiting the Turn 14/15 chicane before the final corner on other laps.

Ricciardo switched from mediums to supersofts at the very end of the session and wound up fifth, 0.7s off the pace, as Kevin Magnussen claimed sixth for Haas.

Magnussen's team-mate Romain Grosjean had a messy session with a big trip through the gravel at Turn 2, but he overhauled Fernando Alonso's McLaren to take seventh.

Carlos Sainz Jr also cleared Alonso in the dying minutes of the session as Renault looks to recover from a difficult Friday.

Sainz had a near-miss with his team-mate at Turn 13 when Nico Hulkenberg arrived at the corner at full-speed and Sainz was moving slowly.

Pierre Gasly completed the top 10, while Hartley's crash prevented any final improvements.

Hartley touched the grass on the entry to the fast right-hand Turn 9 and spun sideways across the gravel into the barriers on the outside.

He emerged unscathed, although the team has a significant rebuild job to get him out for qualifying after the car sustained extensive damage, with the entire rear axle hanging off as it was recovered.

Max Verstappen was dumped to 12th in the second Red Bull.

His session then ended early after a suspected electrical problem, and he was also placed under investigation (and subsequently cleared) after running wide at Turn 1 and not staying to the left of the bollard that is positioned to stop drivers cutting the corner.

The two Williams drivers propped up the times again, with Lance Stroll suffering another excursion into the gravel.

Stroll ran wide at Turn 4 after a wobble on corner entry, although stopped before the barriers and managed to get his car back to the pits.

FP3 times

Pos Driver Car Time Gap Laps
1 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1m17.281s - 15
2 Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 1m17.294s 0.013s 19
3 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 1m17.550s 0.269s 16
4 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 1m17.581s 0.300s 17
5 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull/Renault 1m17.981s 0.700s 16
6 Kevin Magnussen Haas/Ferrari 1m18.357s 1.076s 15
7 Romain Grosjean Haas/Ferrari 1m18.706s 1.425s 16
8 Carlos Sainz Jr. Renault 1m18.783s 1.502s 16
9 Fernando Alonso McLaren/Renault 1m18.847s 1.566s 14
10 Pierre Gasly Toro Rosso/Honda 1m18.886s 1.605s 17
11 Nico Hulkenberg Renault 1m18.905s 1.624s 16
12 Max Verstappen Red Bull/Renault 1m19.013s 1.732s 5
13 Esteban Ocon Force India/Mercedes 1m19.121s 1.840s 20
14 Stoffel Vandoorne McLaren/Renault 1m19.236s 1.955s 17
15 Charles Leclerc Sauber/Ferrari 1m19.292s 2.011s 19
16 Sergio Perez Force India/Mercedes 1m19.376s 2.095s 17
17 Brendon Hartley Toro Rosso/Honda 1m19.428s 2.147s 23
18 Marcus Ericsson Sauber/Ferrari 1m19.744s 2.463s 17
19 Lance Stroll Williams/Mercedes 1m19.900s 2.619s 15
20 Sergey Sirotkin Williams/Mercedes 1m19.909s 2.628s 13


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