Day 3 F1 test: Lewis Hamilton and Ferrari’s strong race simulation and 150-lap marathon in Bahrain. Lewis Hamilton completes 150 laps on day 3 of Bahrain 2026 F1 tests.

Bahrain 2026 F1 test | Day 3, Ferrari hammers with Lewis Hamilton on race pace

Ferrari concluded day 3 of the 2026 Bahrain F1 pre-season tests with Lewis Hamilton, who focused much of his afternoon work on race pace. However, there was a late engine issue – but what caused it?

The Maranello team ran the SF-26 throughout day 3 with Lewis Hamilton, concentrating on long-run simulations that showed positive signs for race performance. The afternoon work highlighted consistency and pace, but rivals also delivered strong performances, keeping the competition level high. The final issue that occurred was carefully examined, and the cause was clarified.

During the morning session, where Hamilton completed 69 laps, he focused mainly on single-lap performance, trying to find maximum speed. In the afternoon, however, the focus shifted to race pace simulations. The British driver tested all three tire compounds available in long-run simulations, and the results were promising. As the seven-time world champion pushed hard with the SF-26, the lap times showed encouraging patterns. The recap of the final part of day 3 reveals the key performance trends, including a late issue. Here’s what happened.

Hamilton impresses on C1, C2, and C3 but SF-26 stops at the end. The reason

After the green light at 13:00 local time, Lewis Hamilton began his afternoon session about thirty minutes later. Ferrari initially ran him on used soft tires for a few aggressive laps without approaching his personal best lap, which remained 1:34.209. Around 14:00, the team started race pace simulations using the softest compound, the C3 tires. The Briton started strongly, but lap times slightly increased toward the end. Here’s the sequence of laps on the C3:

• 1:39.670
• 1:40.098
• 1:39.645
• 1:39.186
• 1:39.323
• 1:39.618
• 1:39.472
• 1:39.918
• 1:39.372
• 1:39.786
• 1:39.999
• 1:40.092
• 1:41.877
• 1:41.089
• 1:40.833
• 1:41.272
• 1:41.517

Immediately after this stint, the British driver switched to hard tires, C3, where lap-time consistency was very positive. He appeared comfortable in the SF-26 even with a relatively high fuel load. Observers noted that Lewis Hamilton seemed to experience slightly more rear-end sensitivity compared to Charles Leclerc. Here’s Lewis Hamilton’s long-run on the hard tires (#44 car):

• 1:38.955
• 1:38.568
• 1:38.797
• 1:38.776
• 1:38.468
• 1:39.151
• 1:39.010
• 1:38.591
• 1:38.967
• 1:39.119
• 1:38.926
• 1:38.906
• 1:38.879
• 1:39.060
• 1:39.543
• 1:39.103

The same type of program was completed by Kimi Antonelli on Mercedes, who appeared a couple of tenths faster than Ferrari, while Oscar Piastri also showed strong performance on the McLaren. The competition is clearly strong.

Hamilton’s final stint in the last half-hour focused on the medium compound, C2. With less than ten minutes remaining, his Ferrari stopped on track near turn 8. Was this the first real reliability issue?

Frédéric Vasseur confirmed to Canal+ that it was only a fuel issue: the car ran out of gasoline. It was a planned test to check the engine’s fuel pickup system. Fred Vasseur stated: “It was a fuel supply problem; we were testing the tank capacity.” Nothing to worry about. Lewis Hamilton completed 150 laps today. The Maranello power unit has now run 854 laps from Barcelona to Bahrain – truly impressive figures.

Here’s the final (incomplete) stint on the C2 tires:

• 1:37.358
• 1:37.346
• 1:37.483
• 1:38.142
• 1:37.281
• 1:37.151
• no live timing
• 1:38.015
• 1:37.544
• no live timing
• 1:37.4
• 1:37.8
• 1:37.9
• 1:38.7
• 1:39.3
• 1:38.746
• 1:38.5
• 1:38.9
• stop on track