Lewis Hamilton beat Nico Rosberg and Sebastian Vettel to top a busy final Formula 1 practice session for the Australian Grand Prix.
With the track dry, Mercedes ran the red-marked super-soft tyres for the first time in 2016 and Hamilton duly clocked a lap of 1m25.624s on a late run to complete a clean-sweep of fastest practice times in Melbourne.
Mercedes team-mate Rosberg was second on the timesheets, 0.176s shy of Hamilton on the same super-soft compound, with Vettel 0.228s adrift in third.
Carlos Sainz Jr starred for Toro Rosso, splitting the two Ferraris on the super-soft tyres in fourth – two tenths of a second clear of Kimi Raikkonen.
Max Verstappen was sixth in the sister Toro Rosso, ahead of Williams’ Valtteri Bottas and Red Bull racer Daniel Ricciardo.
Bottas’ team-mate Felipe Massa and Force India’s Sergio Perez rounded out the top 10.
The two McLarens of Fernando Alonso and Jenson Button were 11th and 12th, from Daniil Kvyat in the second Red Bull and Sauber’s Marcus Ericsson.
Kevin Magnussen was the best of the Renaults in 15th, with new team-mate Jolyon Palmer 17th – the pair split by Nico Hulkenberg’s Force India.
The two Haas team-mates were 18th and 19th, Esteban Gutierrez ahead of Romain Grosjean after the Frenchman missed a chunk of the session after a bizarre pitlane clash with Manor’s F1 rookie Rio Haryanto.
Haryanto ended up 22nd and last on the timesheets, two tenths shy of team-mate and fellow rookie Pascal Wehrlein.
