Verstappen fastest in Bahrain heat as Grosjean crashes

2017 Bahrain Grand Prix third practice

Posted on

| Written by

Max Verstappen put Red Bull on top in the final practice session after Romain Grosjean brought out the red flags by crashing.

The Haas driver complained several times about set-up problems on his car and had just changed his front wing when his car snapped sideways into the barrier at the exit of turn four. Grosjean was able to return to the pits during the ensuing red flag and continue his session.

2017 Bahrain Grand Prixpractice in pictures
Once practice resumed Sebastian Vettel headed the times for Ferrari with the top four drivers briefly covered by just five hundredths of a second. However Verstappen’s late effort lowered the benchmark by over half a second. However it remained over half a second off the best time from the same session last year.

Lewis Hamilton improved to second place with his final run. He was quickest of all through the first two sectors but lost time at the end of the lap.

Daniel Ricciardo’s best effort left him at the tail of the close bunch of drivers led by Vettel. Nico Hulkenberg put his Renault in the top ten ahead of the two Toro Rossos.

High temperatures meant most of the front-running teams left it until the final minutes of the session to run. The track temperatures reached 38C and are unlikely to be replicated in the evening’s qualifying session.

Pos.No.DriverCarBest lapGapLaps
133Max VerstappenRed Bull-TAG Heuer1’32.1948
244Lewis HamiltonMercedes1’32.3040.11010
35Sebastian VettelFerrari1’32.7500.55610
477Valtteri BottasMercedes1’32.7540.56013
57Kimi RaikkonenFerrari1’32.7850.5919
619Felipe MassaWilliams-Mercedes1’32.8010.60712
73Daniel RicciardoRed Bull-TAG Heuer1’32.8090.6158
827Nico HulkenbergRenault1’32.9330.7399
955Carlos Sainz JnrToro Rosso-Renault1’33.6041.41018
1026Daniil KvyatToro Rosso-Renault1’33.7441.55011
1111Sergio PerezForce India-Mercedes1’33.9161.72214
1214Fernando AlonsoMcLaren-Honda1’33.9221.72810
1394Pascal WehrleinSauber-Ferrari1’33.9471.75315
1418Lance StrollWilliams-Mercedes1’33.9651.77115
152Stoffel VandoorneMcLaren-Honda1’34.0271.83315
1631Esteban OconForce India-Mercedes1’34.0641.87017
1720Kevin MagnussenHaas-Ferrari1’34.1982.00413
188Romain GrosjeanHaas-Ferrari1’34.2052.01114
199Marcus EricssonSauber-Ferrari1’34.2682.07415
2030Jolyon PalmerRenault1’34.4172.22311

Third practice visual gaps

Max Verstappen – 1’32.194

+0.110 Lewis Hamilton – 1’32.304

+0.556 Sebastian Vettel – 1’32.750

+0.560 Valtteri Bottas – 1’32.754

+0.591 Kimi Raikkonen – 1’32.785

+0.607 Felipe Massa – 1’32.801

+0.615 Daniel Ricciardo – 1’32.809

+0.739 Nico Hulkenberg – 1’32.933

+1.410 Carlos Sainz Jnr – 1’33.604

+1.550 Daniil Kvyat – 1’33.744

+1.722 Sergio Perez – 1’33.916

+1.728 Fernando Alonso – 1’33.922

+1.753 Pascal Wehrlein – 1’33.947

+1.771 Lance Stroll – 1’33.965

+1.833 Stoffel Vandoorne – 1’34.027

+1.870 Esteban Ocon – 1’34.064

+2.004 Kevin Magnussen – 1’34.198

+2.011 Romain Grosjean – 1’34.205

+2.074 Marcus Ericsson – 1’34.268

+2.223 Jolyon Palmer – 1’34.417

Combined practice times

PosDriverCarFP1FP2FP3Fri/Sat diffTotal laps
1Sebastian VettelFerrari1’32.6971’31.3101’32.750+1.4460
2Valtteri BottasMercedes1’35.0021’31.3511’32.754+1.40375
3Daniel RicciardoRed Bull-TAG Heuer1’33.0971’31.3761’32.809+1.43358
4Kimi RaikkonenFerrari1’42.3331’31.4781’32.785+1.30749
5Lewis HamiltonMercedes1’34.6361’31.5941’32.304+0.7173
6Nico HulkenbergRenault1’34.9271’31.8831’32.933+1.0559
7Felipe MassaWilliams-Mercedes1’34.2461’32.0791’32.801+0.72273
8Max VerstappenRed Bull-TAG Heuer1’33.5661’32.2451’32.194-0.05149
9Romain GrosjeanHaas-Ferrari1’34.5641’32.5051’34.205+1.769
10Daniil KvyatToro Rosso-Renault1’34.8381’32.7071’33.744+1.03759
11Kevin MagnussenHaas-Ferrari1’35.5791’32.8541’34.198+1.34467
12Esteban OconForce India-Mercedes1’34.3321’32.8751’34.064+1.18978
13Jolyon PalmerRenault1’35.0681’32.8761’34.417+1.54168
14Fernando AlonsoMcLaren-Honda1’34.3721’32.8971’33.922+1.02555
15Sergio PerezForce India-Mercedes1’34.0951’33.3191’33.916+0.59770
16Lance StrollWilliams-Mercedes1’34.3221’33.3611’33.965+0.60476
17Carlos Sainz JnrToro Rosso-Renault1’36.0791’34.0721’33.604-0.46839
18Marcus EricssonSauber-Ferrari1’35.8881’33.9441’34.268+0.32472
19Pascal WehrleinSauber-Ferrari1’35.9591’34.1171’33.947-0.1767
20Stoffel VandoorneMcLaren-Honda1’34.9971’34.2301’34.027-0.20333

Don’t forget to make your predictions

Enter your predictions for this weekend’s race before qualifying begins:

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

Got a potential story, tip or enquiry? Find out more about RaceFans and contact us here.

11 comments on “Verstappen fastest in Bahrain heat as Grosjean crashes”

  1. Please let Red Bull be genuinely competitive. Would be so nice.

    1. Do not think so, VET was like 1 second faster yesterday!

  2. Well yesterday’s top times were nearly a second faster…. So again noone knows anything until qualifying

    1. @rike Yeah this has been a very weird weekend so far.

      RedBull over a second back in both Australia and China would normaly mean they’d be even more hampered by their engine deficit in Bahrain. However, so far they have been very close instead.

      The Merc’s, for the same engine related reasons, should be a bit faster compared to RB and Ferrari but they are not by a long shot.

      To top it off FP3 times are slower than the FP2 and even FP1 times and instead of being 5 seconds quicker, this year’s times seem to be SLOWER than last year’s.

      1. Bahrain is more of a chassis track than people give credit for. and although it has more straights than say china, the straights are, relatively speaking, short.

        hence why McLaren are closer to the front, only 1.5 or 1.7 seconds behind the fastest whereas in Australia and china it was more like 2.3 etc

        i’d love to see a comparison of onboards between perez and alonso

        1. But look at the recent past, from 2014 onwards it was the Merc powered cars that dominated Bahrain. Not just Mercedes but also Williams, Force India and even McLaren in 2014 with Merc power dominated the high scoring positions. RedBull, Ferrari and the other cars with their power struggled massively.

          And on the chassis, RedBull weren’t over a second behind just on engine power (that’s not even .5 seconds I recon). They are behind in terms of chassis as well.

          1. Well it could be a number of factors, perhaps red bull found the sweet spot with regards to suspension setup and the tires. Renault isn’t that far behind either this year. This track could suit red bulls car more than Australia and china… etc etc. As I said it could be a combo of many factors. Anyhow, its great to see!

      2. Slower….aka Pirelli’s overly hard tyre non grippy AND non durable tyres.

    2. I am 100% cautiously excited for qualifying this weekend.

  3. It’s too hot poor turbos.

    1. Preserving engines?

Comments are closed.