Kimi Antonelli tops final Madrid F1 practice delayed by Lewis Hamilton shunt

Andrea Kimi Antonelli set the pace for Mercedes in a truncated final practice at Formula 1’s Spanish Grand Prix as Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton crashed. 

Mercedes continued its impressive start to the weekend in Madrid as Antonelli jumped to the top of the timesheets in the closing minutes of FP3, having edged out Charles Leclerc in the Ferrari by 0.166 seconds. 

Championship leader Antonelli has topped two of the three practice sessions and looks the favourite to claim the first pole position at the new Madrid street circuit in qualifying. 

McLaren showed encouraging pace in FP3 as Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris took third and fourth, with Piastri just 0.189s off the benchmark set by Antonelli. 

Max Verstappen took fifth in his Red Bull, while George Russell could only manage sixth in the second Mercedes, ahead of Liam Lawson and Audi’s Nico Hulkenberg. 

Final practice was heavily disrupted when Hamilton crashed at the final corner, leading to length delays while barrier repairs were carried out. FP3 was temporarily stopped, before resuming after around half an hour. 

Hamilton could yet find himself in trouble with the FIA after he ignored repeated instructions from Ferrari and race control to stop his car as he attempted to drive his significantly damaged SF-26 back to the pits. 

The seven-time world champion ended up with the ninth-fastest time ahead of the second Audi of Gabriel Bortoleto. 

FP3 ended under a red flag after Ollie Bearman suffered a big crash at Turn 11 after losing control of his car. 

The incident has left his Haas team with a massive rebuild in the hours before qualifying. 

Lunch has also been cancelled at Williams, where work is ongoing to fix Alex Albon’s car after he glanced the barriers at Turn 21 early in FP3 and did not re-emerge.