McLaren’s Lando Norris has edged Oscar Piastri to top third and final practice at Formula 1’s 2025 Dutch Grand Prix.
Norris will go into qualifying after taking a clean sweep of practice sessions in the Netherlands as he aims to repeat last year’s pole-to-flag victory to further close the gap to his team-mate and title rival.
The final one-hour session got off to a tepid start, largely due to a heavy thunderstorm that hit the Zandvoort track in the early morning and still left a few lingering damp patches as the session got under way in the glistening sun.
It had washed away whatever grip that had built up over the weekend and initially made conditions less representative of qualifying, with the track still declared wet by race control at its 11:30 local start.
Bortoleto led the early running with a 1m12.014s, over two seconds away for Lando Norris’ FP2 benchmark on Friday, with Fernando Alonso, who is aiming to build on a strong Friday showing by Aston Martin, taking on softs to clock a 1m11.082s.
Drivers still optimised their lines through the tricky, high banking on Turn 3, the scene of Lance Stroll’s big accident on Friday, with Yuki Tsunoda suffering a huge snap and Lewis Hamilton also struggling to find some bite in his Ferrari’s front end.
Approaching the halfway point, activity around the 4.226km dune-lined circuit picked up considerably with Friday’s pacesetter Norris firing in a 1m10.262s lap, which was 0.071s faster than team-mate and championship leader Oscar Piastri. That put the pair four tenths clear of medium-tyre-running Max Verstappen.
On his second attempt Piastri found more time to take over the top spot with a 1m10.120s effort, putting him 0.142s of his team-mate.
Oscar Piastri, McLaren
Photo by: Erik Junius
George Russell took third as the quickest of the medium-tyre runners, 0.035s behind Piastri, narrowly ahead of Ferrari pair Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc while Verstappen still looked uncomfortable with an understeering Red Bull and followed down in eighth, behind hard-tyre runner Oliver Bearman.
McLaren flexes its muscle in qualifying sims
McLaren showed more of its true hand inside the final 15 minutes of the session, when Norris stormed to a 1m08.972s, diving well below his 2024 pole position time.
Tellingly, Verstappen conceded almost a second when he crossed the line moments later as chances of a record-equalling fourth home win appear remote.
Piastri also had no real answer to Norris’ blinder, taking second with a lap 0.242s behind.
Russell was the best non-McLaren driver, a whopping 0.886s behind, followed by Williams man Carlos Sainz and Verstappen.
Leclerc’s flyer was also a second slower than Norris in sixth, the Monegasque visibly struggling for grip aboard the Ferrari, followed by Alex Albon and Lance Stroll, who recovered from his FP2 smash.
Racing Bulls man Isack Hadjar kept Friday star Alonso out of the top 10, after the Spaniard had a scary near-miss with Russell at pit entry, which is subject to investigation by the race stewards.
Like Ferrari stablemate Leclerc, Lewis Hamilton appeared to struggle for grip as he clocked the 14th-fastest time.
Qualifying for the penultimate F1 grand prix at Zandvoort, which is set to disappear from the calendar after 2026, follows at 15:00 local CEST time.
F1 Dutch GP – FP3 results
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