2024 F1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix FP3 (Round 17): Russell edges Leclerc by 0.013s to go fastest; Bearman hits the wall to bring out another red flag

The third practice session for the 2024 F1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix concluded on Saturday afternoon, September 14, China Standard Time (UTC+8). Mercedes’ George Russell set the fastest time of 1:42.514, edging Charles Leclerc by a mere 0.013 seconds. Yuki Tsunoda finished 12th in a session interrupted by two red flags.

Alpine’s nightmare continues: after an MGU-H failure in first practice, Esteban Ocon ran into trouble again this session with a suspected ERS issue. He parked his car at the side of the track without even completing a timed lap, ending up 19th on the timesheets. Unlike the sunny, hot conditions on the opening day, light rain fell in Baku on Saturday, further reducing grip on an already dusty, damp and slippery track surface. The drivers had to be even more cautious as they pushed—yet the two rookies were more aggressive than on day one.

Oliver Bearman, standing in for Kevin Magnussen, hit the barriers with 27 minutes remaining in the session: he braked too late for Turn 1 and ran into the run-off area, where he was unable to avoid hitting the wall with the left-front of his car. “How could I be so stupid?” “I’m really sorry,” the 19-year-old Briton said, repeatedly apologising to his team. Franco Colapinto, who had himself crashed in first practice, steadily closed on team-mate Alex Albon and finished just 0.044 seconds behind.

Around 20 minutes after the red flag was lifted, the timesheets began changing rapidly: the two McLarens occupied third and fourth, with Lando Norris 0.223 seconds off the pace and Oscar Piastri 0.235 seconds behind, pushing Max Verstappen—who was around 0.1 seconds further back—down to fifth. Lewis Hamilton was tenth, the only driver from the leading four teams to be noticeably off the pace. However, with a yellow flag waved on average every two minutes during the session, the timesheets offer only a very limited guide—if qualifying is similarly chaotic, the teams will need to head out earlier.

Tsunoda described the session as “chaotic”. He tussled with both Aston Martins near the front of the midfield: he narrowly lost out to Fernando Alonso by 0.029 seconds but beat Lance Stroll by 0.068 seconds, ending up 12th; team-mate Daniel Ricciardo was 0.367 seconds slower than Tsunoda in 14th. Williams continued its strong form this weekend, with Albon and Colapinto eighth and ninth respectively, both inside the top 10.

Qualifying will take place at 20:00 China Standard Time (UTC+8) that evening.