Charles Leclerc led George Russell midway through the final day of the only Formula 1 test of the 2023 season in Bahrain as McLaren and Alfa Romeo ran into trouble.
The hot day conditions did not prevent Mercedes and Ferrari from running soft tire runs in the first two hours of the third day of testing.
Leclerc ended up fastest at 1m31.024s on C4 tyres, a time that was within half a second of his 2022 pole time on C3s in cooler night conditions.
Russell was 0.418 seconds slower than Leclerc and used the softer C5 tires for the fastest lap.
The top three is completed by Aston Martin reserve driver Felipe Drugovic, who remains a potential F1 debut next weekend in place of the injured Lance Stroll.
Drojovic was 1.051 seconds behind Leclerc in third ahead of Red Bull’s Sergio Perez who set his fastest lap on C3 tyres.
Pérez’s RB19 was the cause of the first red flag of the day as he dropped the car’s antenna sensor and needed to be cleared by the marshals.
Perez will drive for Red Bull all day Saturday as two-time Formula 1 champion Max Verstappen completed his run yesterday evening.
Pierre Gasly finished fifth for Albin, ahead of fellow ex-Red Bull driver Alex Albon in his Williams.
Nico Hulkenberg was the seventh fastest of the Haas team whose reserve driver Pietro Fittipaldi thought he was sitting between “fifth and seventh” in the standings this year.
McLaren’s troubled testing continued as Oscar Piastri suffered brake cooling problems similar to those suffered by Lando Norris on the opening day.
Piastri’s MCL60 spent a great deal of time in the garage with his McLaren mechanics taking care of his brakes.
This limited his run to 44 laps and he was eighth on the schedule, 2.631 seconds behind Leclerc.
Valtteri Bottas had to stall his new Alfa Romeo at Turn 8 with just over an hour left to run and caused the second real red flag of the day (outside of FIA testing procedures).
Bottas had logged 72 laps prior to this pit stop and had not run since. He will be in the car for the latter half of the day, as will Albon and Perez.
Nyck de Vries backed up the schedule in tenth place with AlphaTauri’s primary focus on the longer distances. The 2023 rookie logged more laps than any other driver with 87 laps.
Day 3 Morning test times
1. Leclerc (Ferrari) 1m 31.024s, C4, 67 laps
2. Russell (Mercedes) 1m 31.442s, C5, 83laps
3. Drugovich (Aston Martin) 1m 32.075s, C5, 77laps
4. Perez (Red Bull) 1m 32.459s, C3, 69laps
5. Gazelle (Alpine) 1m 32.762sec, C3, 56laps
6. Albon (Williams) 1m 32.793s, C4, 53laps
7. Hulkenberg (Haas) 1d 33.329s, C3, 77 laps
8. Piastri (McLaren) 1m 33.655s C3 44 laps
9. Bottas (Alfa Romeo) 1m 36.854s, C3, 72laps
10. De Vries (AlphaTauri) 1m 38.244s, C3, 87 laps
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