George Russell narrowly beat Lando Norris in a red-flag affected final practice at the Formula 1 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, as title hopeful Max Verstappen completed the top three.
The Mercedes driver set a 1m23.334s which put him just 0.004s above the championship leader, who topped both Friday practice sessions to look like the driver to beat at Yas Marina.
This comes on the final weekend of the 2025 season, where Norris may clinch a maiden title as he is 12 points above second-placed Verstappen with McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri 16 behind.
Despite that, it was still a slow start to FP3 with teams reluctant to burn through tyre sets in unrepresentative conditions, considering it began two and a half hours before the grand prix is scheduled to do so on Sunday.
The opening 15 minutes therefore saw just the Alpine drivers set proper laps, but then the track slightly ramped up and Norris immediately set the pace with a 1m24.728s on soft tyres.
That was the preferred rubber for most and initially drivers struggled to beat the lap time Norris set, even if the McLaren racer improved again by 0.195s as the session approached halfway.
Lando Norris, McLaren
Photo by: Andy Hone/ LAT Images via Getty Images
But that’s when track evolution started to become apparent, by which point the whole grid was finally out on the circuit meaning everything was now very busy with traffic a concern.
Norris, for example, swerved to avoid a slow Yuki Tsunoda into Turn 12 while Liam Lawson also had trouble with Esteban Ocon ahead, yet some drivers still managed to complete a clean lap.
Verstappen was one of them and the world champion went top with a 1m24.245s, which was 0.059s quicker than Lance Stroll and 0.086s better than Oliver Bearman.
It was quite a random top three because of the track evolution as Norris had dropped to sixth with Piastri 15th, but then this very busy period came to an abrupt end.
That’s because Lewis Hamilton spun into the Turn 9 barrier with 29 minutes remaining and the Ferrari driver reported that “something buckled at the front and snapped the rear” as he hit the apex.
The first red flag of the weekend therefore came out, before FP3 resumed with 18 minutes remaining.
Lewis Hamilton, Ferrari
Photo by: Alessandro Martellotta / Alessio Morgese / NurPhoto via Getty Images
Many used the final stages as an opportunity to complete further quali runs, meaning lap times continued to get quicker starting with Verstappen who set a 1m24.116s.
But moments later Piastri stormed to the top with a time that was 0.523s quicker than Verstappen, before Norris beat his team-mate by 0.255s thanks to a stellar final sector.
Drama also occurred in the pitlane as Mercedes released Andrea Kimi Antonelli straight into Tsunoda, whose session was cut short due to the collision.
Teams were clearly in a rush to get laps in at the end as times were continuing to fall, as Russell then went fastest with a 1m23.334s in the final minutes.
It was a time which went unbeaten, meaning Russell topped the session by 0.004s ahead of Norris with Verstappen completing the top three, 0.180s off the Mercedes driver.
Fernando Alonso then claimed a shock fourth, 0.251s behind Russell, with Piastri a further 0.008s behind in fifth as Haas performed strongly with sixth (Ocon) and seventh (Bearman).
FP3 wasn’t so good for Ferrari though as the best it could muster was eighth through Charles Leclerc, 0.341s off top, as Antonelli and Alex Albon completed the top 10.
F1 Abu Dhabi GP – FP3 results
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– The Autosport.com Team
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