Max Verstappen topped the final practice session in Monaco as the teams used their last hour of preparation before the most important qualifying session of the season.
Verstappen put in the fastest time of the session on the soft tyre with a laptime of 1:12.776s but it was a session of what ifs, with Lewis Hamilton and Kevin Magnussen both slowing the session down with Red Flags and Yellow Flags respectively, meaning multiple drivers couldn’t put in their best lap times.
Sergio Perez put in the second fastest laptime, just under a tenth behind his Dutch teammate. Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll was behind the two Red Bulls with an impressive effort.
Carlos Sainz Jr. finished in fourth on the timesheets, a further three-tenths back from Stroll with Scuderia Ferrari suffering some issues throughout the session, especially through the swimming pool section of the circuit. Yesterday, Ferrari impressed but with Sainz in fourth, well down on the Red Bulls and Charles Leclerc even further behind in seventh, their hopes of pole position around the streets of Monaco may be slowly fading away.
Lando Norris continued his impressive form in Monaco, placing fifth ahead of both Mercedes drivers. It is known that the circuit is one of Norris’ favourites having scored a podium in Monaco with McLaren in 2021, and he’ll be hoping for similar with McLaren sporting a limited edition historical livery. Pierre Gasly also impressed with BWT Alpine F1 Team putting in the sixth fastest time of the session.
Hamilton, who ended the session early, finished in eighth but it wasn’t a true reflection of his performance with the seven-time world champion setting the fastest first sector but his incident that saw him bring out the red flag. George Russell was also affected by the red flag and was unable to get his lap in meaning he finished down in eleventh behind Esteban Ocon and Valtteri Bottas.
The Haas F1 Team duo of Magnussen and Nico Hulkenberg finished ahead of Fernando Alonso in fourteenth, who much like Hamilton was unable to do his push lap with a number of incidents happening around him. Alonso has previously made claims he can win at Monaco for Aston Martin, but he’ll need to find the perfect lap in qualifying to do that.
Yuki Tsunoda and Nyck de Vries failed to make an impact on the top ten finishing fifteenth and twentieth respectively. The Williams Racing duo of Logan Sargeant and Alex Albon started the weekend well but fell down the order today finishing in seventeenth and eighteenth.
Oscar Piastri admitted on Friday that he was lacking confidence around the streets of Monte-Carlo, and that showed again today with the Australian rookie finishing down in nineteenth, six-tenths behind his teammate.
The Formula 1 action continues with qualifying, which promises to be an action-packed spectacle.
