Valtteri Bottas set the best time in the final practice session ahead of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix as problems hit both Sebastian Vettel and Max Verstappen.
Coming partially blind into Saturday after yellow flags heavily disrupted Friday, teams were expected to try to make use of the hour-long session, however, with conditions not reminiscent of qualifying later, that was not the case with only a maximum of 24 laps completed by a single driver, that being Daniel Riccardo.
Problems started early as Jolyon Palmer’s Renault caught fire in the first 10 minutes, after just four laps but later Vettel would miss much of the final 30 minutes and Verstappen would stop out on the circuit with 10 minutes left both with suspected hydraulics issues.
As was the case on Friday, many drivers struggled to find grip with several running into the escape roads at Turns 2 and 3. Romain Grosjean would also have a spin as he looked to make up for finishing bottom of the times in Practice 2.
Bottas would eventually emerge, however, posting a best of 1m42.742s as fellow countryman Kimi Raikkonen gave Ferrari their best spot so far this weekend in second, less than a tenth slower than the Mercedes.
Lewis Hamilton would have a better session in third with Ricciardo fourth as Red Bull’s domination on Friday was interrupted.
Ocon continued his good performance finishing fifth as Force India again had both cars in the top 10 with team-mate Sergio Perez in ninth.
Verstappen would be sixth despite his issues as Williams matched their pink rivals with Felipe Massa bouncing back after a slow start to the weekend in seventh. Danill Kvyat would make it three top 10 results in all three practices in eighth and Lance Stroll continued his strong form in ninth.
Nico Hulkenberg gave Renault some reason for optimism in 11th after Palmer’s problems while McLaren, who have seen their combined grid penalties reach a total of 70 places, had Fernando Alonso in 14th, half a second clear of team-mate Stoffel Vandoorne in 16th.
Grosjean had the aforementioned spin as well as a long brake pedal in the final minutes as the Frenchman was only 17th, two places behind Haas partner Kevin Magnussen as the American team’s poor weekend continued.
With many teams not enjoying a clean weekend and failing to finish their preset programs, it should make the qualifying session trickier and harder to predict, spicing things up for the fans.
