Practice report
Formula 1 Chinese GP
Chinese GP: Bottas quickest in FP3, big crash for Albon
Valtteri Bottas went quickest for Mercedes in what proved to be an unrepresentative final practice session for the 2019 Formula 1 Chinese Grand Prix.
Stuart Codling
Edited: Apr 13, 2019, 4:19 AM
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Practice was red-flagged with five minutes remaining when Alexander Albon ran wide at the exit of the final corner and smote his Toro Rosso against the barrier.
Honours were split in Friday practice as Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel went fastest in the first session and Bottas topped the second, while analysis of long-run times suggested the teams were closely matched on potential race pace.
But final practice ended with question marks still hanging over the teams’ relative performance because the stoppage interrupted the final runs.
After the initial qualifying-simulation runs Vettel was on top with an impressive 1m33.222s, 0.734s ahead of Lewis Hamilton, who was fractionally faster than Bottas, but the Ferrari was running on Pirelli’s soft compound while both Mercedes were on the mediums. Despite being quickest of all through the second sector, Charles Leclerc was only fourth at this point, nearly eighth tenths off his teammate’s pace.
With 10 minutes remaining Leclerc attempted a second run but had only improved to 1m33.248s, third-quickest behind Vettel, when the session stopped.
Red Bull sat out half the 60-minute session before mobilising. Pierre Gasly was first to hit the track but his first run, on medium tyres, was scruffy in places and left him outside the top 10. He never got to set a timed lap on soft tyres.
Max Verstappen’s first run of 1m34.447s, on soft tyres, was good enough for fifth but a yawning 1.225s away from Vettel’s initial benchmark. His attempts to improve were scuppered by the red flag and he ended the session seventh, usurped by Nico Hulkenberg’s Renault and Kimi Raikkonen’s Alfa Romeo - both getting final soft-tyred runs in before the red flag.
When the leading group emerged for their second runs with 10 minutes to go, Bottas leapt to the top of the timesheet on soft tyres with a 1m32.830s, faster than Vettel by 0.392s. The stoppage then put paid to Vettel’s attempts to improve his earlier time, and a scruffy lap by Hamilton at the beginning of his second run left the other Mercedes fourth fastest.
Albon and Daniil Kvyat had been sixth and seventh for Toro Rosso after the first qualifying simulations on soft tyres and separated by just a tenth. But they were bumped down the order to ninth and 10th in the final reckoning and may even have slumped further had other midfield runners been able to make final runs.
McLaren’s Carlos Sainz was one midfielder who got a second run in before the red flag and he ended the session eighth. Teammate Lando Norris also briefly figured in the top 10 for McLaren but his second run was compromised by an off at the final corner.
Both Racing Points were in the top 10 after the first runs but Sergio Perez and Lance Stroll, like Renault’s Daniel Ricciardo, were also stymied by the early stoppage.
The two Alfa Romeos came close to having a contretemps on the back straight shortly after the half-way mark, after which Raikkonen suggested teammate Antonio Giovinazzi had deliberately moved over on him.
Haas drivers Romain Grosjean and Kevin Magnussen languished at the bottom of the timesheets with only the Williams for company for the balance of the session, courtesy of middling-paced initial efforts on medium tyres. The red flag also cost them the opportunity of moving upwards.
Session results
Cla # Driver Chassis Engine Laps Time Gap Interval km/h 1 77 
Valtteri Bottas Mercedes Mercedes 11 1'32.830 211.392 2 5 
Sebastian Vettel Ferrari Ferrari 12 1'33.222 0.392 0.392 210.503 3 16 
Charles Leclerc Ferrari Ferrari 10 1'33.248 0.418 0.026 210.445 4 44 
Lewis Hamilton Mercedes Mercedes 10 1'33.689 0.859 0.441 209.454 5 27 Nico Hulkenberg Renault Renault 11 1'33.974 1.144 0.285 208.819 6 7 Kimi Raikkonen Alfa Romeo Ferrari 14 1'34.246 1.416 0.272 208.216 7 33 
Max Verstappen Red Bull Honda 5 1'34.447 1.617 0.201 207.773 8 55 
Carlos Sainz Jr. McLaren Renault 9 1'34.510 1.680 0.063 207.635 9 23 
Alex Albon Toro Rosso Honda 11 1'34.600 1.770 0.090 207.437 10 26 
Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso Honda 10 1'34.783 1.953 0.183 207.037 11 4 Lando Norris McLaren Renault 11 1'34.938 2.108 0.155 206.699 12 11 
Sergio Perez Racing Point Mercedes 9 1'35.078 2.248 0.140 206.394 13 3 
Daniel Ricciardo Renault Renault 11 1'35.142 2.312 0.064 206.255 14 18 
Lance Stroll Racing Point Mercedes 10 1'35.223 2.393 0.081 206.080 15 10 
Pierre Gasly Red Bull Honda 8 1'35.326 2.496 0.103 205.857 16 99 
Antonio Giovinazzi Alfa Romeo Ferrari 12 1'35.726 2.896 0.400 204.997 17 8 Romain Grosjean Haas Ferrari 14 1'35.771 2.941 0.045 204.901 18 20 
Kevin Magnussen Haas Ferrari 15 1'35.998 3.168 0.227 204.416 19 63 George Russell Williams Mercedes 10 1'36.124 3.294 0.126 204.148 20 88 
Robert Kubica Williams Mercedes 11 1'36.176 3.346 0.052 204.038
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