Norris stays ahead but Leclerc keeps it close in third Monza practice

Lando Norris led the final practice session of the Italian Grand Prix ahead of Charles Leclerc, with the McLaren and Ferrari drivers separated by less than 0.1s for the second session in succession.

Norris rocketed to top spot with his first run on soft tires, setting the benchmark at 1m19.331s. Leclerc, meanwhile, had a troubled first run on softs. He dipped his rear-left wheel onto the gravel exiting the second Lesmo turn and was required to save a massive snap, and though he continued with the lap, there was clearly time left on the table. A second attempt on used softs restored him to the second place he held in FP2, slashing Friday’s deficit of 0.083s down to just 0.021s.

As on Friday, the Ferrari made up all its time down the straights. Leclerc was more than 0.3s quicker than Norris in the first sector, but the Briton clawed it all back and fractionally more through the track’s few high-speed corners to pinch top spot by the end of the hour.

On his first lap Norris was followed closely on the road by teammate Oscar Piastri, whose initial lap put him 0.247s further back. The bulk of the difference came through the two Lesmo corners in the middle sector, where Norris has been the quicker McLaren all weekend.

Both drivers embarked on a second tour on used softs. Piastri slashed his deficit down to 0.165s, but Norris couldn’t improve – though even his slower lap was quicker than Piastri’s new best, albeit by just 0.004s.

Max Verstappen initially split the McLaren drivers after the first runs before Piastri’s improvements bumped him back down. The Dutchman embarked on a second lap at the very end of the hour and improved, but not by enough to overhaul Piastri again, trailing the Australian by just 0.002s.

George Russell completed the top five in Mercedes’s most convincing performance of the weekend so far. The Mercedes driver was 0.184s slower than Norris but was quicker than most of the rest of the front-runners in the final sector.

Gabriel Bortoleto was an excellent sixth for Sauber, with the Ferrari-engined car matching the Ferrari works team for speed down the straights and for time in the opening sector. He was 0.227s off top spot and ahead of Lewis Hamilton, who faded in his scarlet Scuderia car with his second lap.

The Briton led Leclerc after his first lap but couldn’t keep up the pace. He ended the session 0.267s off the pace after radioing his team that he need “some more juice … some more speed somehow.”

Isack Hadjar completed a top eight spread over just 0.272s in a strong showing for Racing Bulls, though the Frenchman will see the stewards after the session for running off track at the Roggia chicane and not rejoining at the designated part of the exit.

Andrea Kimi Antonelli recovered from missing almost all of FP2 with a workmanlike final practice session that delivered him a respectable ninth and 0.365s off the pace – and only 0.181s slower than Russell.

Alex Albon was 10th for Williams and 0.389s off Norris’s benchmark in a comedown from Williams’s Friday optimism, the British team struggling on Saturday to light up the tires in the same way it had done 24 hours earlier.

Nico Hulkenberg was 11th ahead of Fernando Alonso, Carlos Sainz and Franco Colapinto.

Yuki Tsunoda was 15th and 0.728s off the pace ahead of Liam Lawson, who suspected he damaged the left side of his floor running wide over some curbs and onto the gravel at the Roggia chicane.

Oliver Bearman was 17th ahead of Pierre Gasly, Lance Stroll and Esteban Ocon at the bottom of the order, the last-named Frenchman having incurred the ire of Verstappen for racing him into the first chicane early in the hour.

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