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George Russell led a Mercedes 1-2 in a rain-affected final practice session at Formula 1's British Grand Prix.
Intermediates were the tyre of choice in FP3 with rain throughout Saturday morning at Silverstone soaking the track. The Formula 3 sprint race that was supposed to take place before FP3 was postponed but the conditions did at least improve for FP3 running to take place.
It didn't take long for a driver to be caught out though as Pierre Gasly, who is already facing a back-of-the-grid penalty for exceeding the maximum number of engine components allowed in the season, caused the sole red flag of FP3.
🔴 RED FLAG 🔴
— Formula 1 (@F1) July 6, 2024
Gasly has beached himself in the gravel heading into Vale #F1 #BritishGP pic.twitter.com/Qmbo0lCC6k
Less than 10 minutes into the session he lost control of his Alpine and went backwards into the gravel at the Vale chicane.
His beached car caused the red flag and he was forced to watch the rest of the session from the Alpine garage.
Mercedes fastest
The conditions hardly made the final timesheet representative of who will be on top in qualifying later but there was still a decent amount of running for a wet practice session.
Mercedes' home drivers led the way with Russell topping the session on a 1m37.529s, 0.035s ahead of team-mate Lewis Hamilton.
Lando Norris, who topped both practice sessions on Friday, completed the all-British top three ahead of Carlos Sainz's Ferrari and points leader Max Verstappen, who ensured there were four different teams in the top five.
Charles Leclerc was sixth quickest for Ferrari ahead of the second McLaren of Oscar Piastri and the Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso.
Sergio Perez found himself ninth but his fastest effort was 1.7s off Russell's pace and he was almost a second adrift of Red Bull team-mate Verstappen.
Nico Hulkenberg continued his strong weekend for Haas by rounding out the top 10 ahead of Alex Albon and Lance Stroll.
Daniel Ricciardo - 18th fastest - faces a post-FP3 investigation for weaving in the pitlane when returning to his RB pits.
FP3 times
| Pos | Name | Car | Best Time | Gap Leader |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | George Russell | Mercedes | 1m37.529s | |
| 2 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | 1m37.564s | +0.035s |
| 3 | Lando Norris | McLaren-Mercedes | 1m37.714s | +0.185s |
| 4 | Carlos Sainz | Ferrari | 1m38.139s | +0.610s |
| 5 | Max Verstappen | Red Bull-Honda RBPT | 1m38.393s | +0.864s |
| 6 | Charles Leclerc | Ferrari | 1m38.454s | +0.925s |
| 7 | Oscar Piastri | McLaren-Mercedes | 1m38.654s | +1.125s |
| 8 | Fernando Alonso | Aston Martin-Mercedes | 1m38.940s | +1.411s |
| 9 | Sergio Pérez | Red Bull-Honda RBPT | 1m39.284s | +1.755s |
| 10 | Nico Hülkenberg | Haas-Ferrari | 1m39.340s | +1.811s |
| 11 | Alex Albon | Williams-Mercedes | 1m39.603s | +2.074s |
| 12 | Lance Stroll | Aston Martin-Mercedes | 1m39.700s | +2.171s |
| 13 | Logan Sargeant | Williams-Mercedes | 1m39.702s | +2.173s |
| 14 | Yuki Tsunoda | Red Bull-Honda RBPT | 1m39.820s | +2.291s |
| 15 | Valtteri Bottas | Sauber-Ferrari | 1m40.242s | +2.713s |
| 16 | Esteban Ocon | Alpine-Renault | 1m40.430s | +2.901s |
| 17 | Kevin Magnussen | Haas-Ferrari | 1m40.539s | +3.010s |
| 18 | Daniel Ricciardo | RB-Honda RBPT | 1m40.823s | +3.294s |
| 19 | Guanyu Zhou | Sauber-Ferrari | 1m41.785s | +4.256s |
