Here is our full text transcript of the final free practice session for the 2023 Formula 1 Italian Grand Prix:
Good morning and welcome back to a sunny Monza for Qualifying day at the 2023 Italian Grand Prix. If yesterday’s running is anything to go by, Ferrari have a strong chance of taking pole position and being in the fight for the win. McLaren are up there too, so Red Bull might not have it all their own way this weekend.
This weekend sees the Alternative Tyre Allocation at Monza as part of F1’s push to save the amount of tyres used. The drivers have 11 sets for the entire weekend and interestingly, Lewis Hamilton has an extra set of soft tyres up his sleeve.
59 mins to go: A crucial final 60 minutes of track time before Qualifying has begun. It’s instantly pretty busy out there, with Lance Stroll unsurprisingly straight out on track having not been able to complete a lap yesterday.
55 mins to go: We haven’t seen anything too quick yet, but it’s Sergio Perez who sits top of the timesheet in the early stages. It’s a 1:22.662 that has him 0.3s clear of Lewis Hamilton in second. Lando Norris has found some pace early on on the soft tyres and he has gone just over a tenth faster than Sergio Perez with a 1:22.515.
51 mins to go: Surprise, surprise… With his first flying lap, Max Verstappen shoots to the top of the timesheet with 1:21.838, and Sergio Perez follows up to make it a Red Bull one-two. Perez is 0.354 back from Verstappen, which isn’t too bad by recent standards…
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49 mins to go: That is a close one for Hamilton! He locks up the front, loses his grip, and goes straight off at turn one. “He went too aggressively,” says Nico Rosberg. He manages to recover though and gets back out onto the track. That’s more like it from Lewis Hamilton. He slots in behind the Red Bulls with a 1:22.279, but it is almost half a second back from Verstappen. Carlos Sainz puts in a purple first sector, but can only manage fourth behind Hamilton. Literally, Lando Norris’ McLaren is airborne. The Brit wasn’t too excited after finishing second behind Carlos Sainz in second practice yesterday, warning that the result may have been a little flattering.
35 mins to go: There are concerns over the role traffic could play in Qualifying later today, with a high potential for impeding to be a major factor. Lewis Hamilton was just able to get some car-dodging practice in as he came up behind a slow-moving Williams and was forced to take evasive action. You might be thinking it’s a Red Bull one-two, order has been restored. However, Verstappen’s 1:21.687 is slower than the fastest five times from second practice, so it’s certainly not all about Red Bull yet. Lewis Hamilton already looks happier with the car after Mercedes made some changes overnight to find a better setup for the seven-time world champion.
31 mins to go: Kevin Magnussen has put in a brilliant flying lap now and is in third, just 0.571 seconds off the pace. Liam Lawson has also moved up the timesheet to 16th and is 1.881 seconds off the pace, with Yuki Tsunoda in 14th and 1.400 seconds behind leader Verstappen.
27 mins to go: An eventful few moments there for Logan Sargeant…First he dipped a wheel, or maybe both, into the gravel, before reporting that his left mirror is broken. Maybe the vibrations from the gravel were a factor? In any case, he’s briefly dropped back into the pits and the issue appears to have been fixed.
24 mins to go: Alex Albon has just been so consistent recently, and he puts in another eye-catching lap to split the Red Bulls. That one came on the new medium tyre that he’s just put on the Williams. We’re expecting to see some quicker times in the closing stages with the front-runners likely to head out on fresh tyres.
20 mins to go: Oscar Piastri did a good first sector that looked to have him on course to move up the timesheet, but then ran off into the gravel at Turn 5. He’ll be relieved to have avoided any major damage and is back out on track after a quick check in the pit lane.
There’s an almost immediate response to that Lando Norris incident, with the result a black and white flag for Alfa Romeo’s Zhou Guanyu, who was guilty of impeding the McLaren.
13 mins to go: The Mercedes come out on fresh soft tyres, and it’s Lewis Hamilton who gets the best of team-mate George Russell. Hamilton goes fastest with a 1:21.453, while Russell slots in behind Max Verstappen in third, almost 0.3s back from his team-mate. It will be interesting to see how that compares to Verstappen’s next effort, with the Dutchman heading out on new tyres himself now. Here he is! Max Verstappen flies in his final sector and is back at the top of the timesheet once again with a 1:20.988. That puts him nearly half a second quicker than Lewis Hamilton in second. The Aston Martins have also improved, with Fernando Alonso jumping to fourth just over three tenths off the pace, Lance Stroll in eighth and over a second off the pace.
8 mins to go: More bad news for Sergio Perez after his crash in second practice yesterday. The Mexican is out of his Red Bull and appears to be done for the session, with the team working to fix some sort of issue. Hopefully it’s nothing that will impact his chances in Qualifying later today. The Mercedes garage have just let Lewis Hamilton know that Max Verstappen is four and a half tenths quicker than him at the moment, leaving Hamilton perplexed. “I don’t know how to find that half a second,” he says.
6 mins to go: Is a pole position on for Ferrari at their home race? It appears so, as Carlos Sainz delivers again with a 1:20.912 to go almost a tenth clear of Verstappen at the top of the timesheet. Charles Leclerc was also on a fast lap, but ran wide in the middle sector and then aborted. The crowd are happy with that Carlos Sainz lap! On his second attempt at a flying lap, having taken some life out of those new soft tyres, Charles Leclerc can only manage fourth. He’s more than half a second back from Ferrari team-mate Carlos Sainz.
Chequered Flag: Carlos Sainz is the leader after practice three! He leads Max Verstappen by 0.086 seconds, Lewis Hamilton, Charles Leclerc, and Fernando Alonso then making up the top five. “I feel like the threat is really from Ferrari,” says Anthony Davidson.
He might have topped the session, but Carlos Sainz has been given a black and white flag for impeding Oscar Piastri. The Spaniard is pretty lucky to get away with that after his lack of awareness caused a minor collision with the McLaren. Piastri had some unsavoury words for Sainz over team radio, while the Ferrari driver has protested his innocence and suggested the Australian was responsible.
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