It’s two-one to Lewis Hamilton after he topped the final free practice session in Malaysia.
The two Mercedes drivers were split by Max Verstappen, who managed second place for Red Bull, with Nico Rosberg taking third.
Daniel Ricciardo set the early pace as the first driver to get into the 1:36s on the cooler track. In the opening stages of the session, Ricciardo was the only driver running qualifying simulations, with many opting to look at longer runs.
Sergio Perez, with soft tyres bolted onto his Force India, took the top spot but it didn’t look like it was going to last much longer when the Mercedes drivers headed out on medium tyres.
Hamilton’s first time put him only four-tenths of a second behind Perez, but his team mate slotted in at only eleventh. The explanation for that lay with Haas.
The Haas team were having a difficult time in the first half of the session. Romain Grosjean found himself in the gravel on multiple occasions as the newly laid tarmac lending itself to increased oversteer.
Esteban Gutierrez was also having trouble and was sent into a spin. Rosberg, who was right behind him, was forced to back off, slowing down in the final sector. Moments later, Grosjean spun again at a separate corner meaning the Frenchman wasn’t too happy.
“Okay, I’m not saying there’s something wrong with the car… but can you find out because it’s pointless driving around now,” came his optimistic radio message to the team.
Haas weren’t the only ones struggling, though. A few minutes later, Sebastian Vettel span at the low-speed hairpin at Turn 15, wiping out the pit lane bollard in the process.
Meanwhile, Rosberg had set another time, this time with no dancing Haas’ ahead of him. The German jumped to the top of the timing sheet on medium tyres, but it wasn’t long before his team mate demoted him back down to second.
Ricciardo hadn’t been too far away from the Mercedes drivers, though, and, with soft tyres strapped on, he was ready to take the top spot. That he did, but not by much compared to Hamilton’s times on medium tyres.
Mercedes waited a few minutes before putting the soft tyres on their cars. Rosberg was the first out, but the German struggled a little in the first two sectors. A fantastic final sector, however, was enough to put him at the top of the timing sheet, but he was less than two-tenths of a second ahead of Ricciardo.
Hamilton showed him how it was done, the first driver going sub 1:35 when he set an astonishing time of 1:34.434. Rosberg was able to better his time, but it wasn’t enough to beat his team mate and he had to settle for second.
Elsewhere, Pascal Wehrlein had trouble again. The Manor driver had already spent a lot of time in the pits early on in the session, reporting throttle issues. After having his car up on the jacks, the team thought they’d fixed the problem, but something was still wrong and he returned to the pits.
Ferrari wanted some of the soft tyre action, sending Vettel out on the softest compound first. The German could only manage third, about two tenths slower than Rosberg, but he was beaten into fourth by team mate Kimi Raikkonen, who was 0.14s faster than Vettel.
The familiar Mercedes one-two looked comfortable at the top of the timing sheet in the closing stages of the session, but Verstappen had other ideas.
The teenager had been fairly anonymous for the majority of the session, but in the final minutes, he set a lap time of 1:34.879, nearly two-tenths of a second faster than Rosberg.
That would be how the session ended, with the early pace setter Ricciardo demoted down to sixth. Nico Hulkenberg, Valtteri Bottas, Carlos Sainz, and Felipe Massa completed the top ten.
