Sebastian Vettel beat his own track record of the Albert Park in the third free practice session ahead of Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton. The session was shortened following Lance Stroll’s accident.
The information of the night came from Sauber and Pascal Wehrlein who did not feel well enough to keep on competing that week-end. I was replaced by Antonio Giovinazzi as soon as FP3 for the rest of the week-end.
Romain Grosjean (Haas) was the first driver to join the track for the last free-practice session. His teammate although had to remain in the early stages of the session. Both Ferrari went out straight away with ultra-soft tyres, proving they were heavy on fuel on the first day.
While he was attempting to set another flying lap, Kimi Räikkönen (Ferrari) got a puncture which stopped him halfway through the lap but he eventually managed to re-join the pits.
Halfway through the session, only Ferrari among top teams had used ultra-soft tyres. After his misadventure in the early stages of the session, Räikkönen took fastest time from his teammate for one thousandths before Vettel responded by beating his own track record at the Albert Park.
With twenty minutes to go, Mercedes cars went out on ultra-soft tyres. In his first attempt, Valtteri Bottas (Mercedes) got in between the two Ferrari while Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes), who claimed the fastest first sector, eventually settled for second.
With ten minutes to go, Lance Stroll (Williams) hit the wall on the outside of turn 11 in his flying lap, provoking a red flag which prevented the session to resume.
Sebastian Vettel ended free practice with a lap record in 1:23.380 ahead of Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton. Räikkönen, Hülkenberg, Ricciardo, Grosjean, Sainz, Kvyat and Magnussen completed the top 10.
