Perez leads Verstappen as Red Bull dominates final Abu Dhabi practice

Red Bull put itself out of reach of its rivals in Saturday's third and final practice I Abu Dhabi, with Sergio Perez edging teammate Max Verstappen by 0.152s.

Behind the leading duo, Lewis Hamilton and George Russell made the most of their session, with the former trailing Perez by 0.240s.

However, Hamilton was placed under investigation by the stewards for potentially overtaking under the red flag in the session, which means that a penalty could be looming for the Briton.

• 2021 Abu Dhabi GP Free Practice 3 - Results

As the countdown to his final race continues, Sebastian Vettel was the first driver to take to the track when the light went green, the Aston Martin driver heading out for his final F1 practice session of his career, although one Lewis Hamilton would perhaps beg to differ…

Ferrari's drivers established the first benchmarks but were quickly relayed by their Mercedes counterparts.

It was a leisurely start for Max Verstappen however, the Dutchman emerging from after 25 minutes but getting immediately up to speed as he slotted himself among the top-three.

The red flag was briefly displayed for AlphaTauri's Pierre Gasly whose car was seen losing its right front wheel guard as it ran over a kerb, which required the track to be cleared of the debris.

However, the incident may have landed Hamilton in hot water with the stewards as the Mercedes driver was put under investigation for overtaking under the red flag as it was deployed at Yas Marina's Turn 5.

That didn't deter the Briton however who continued to set the fastest time. But with 15 minutes to go, Perez laid down a lap in 1m24.982s that edged Hamilton by a comfortable 0.240s.

Verstappen followed suit but the Dutchman came up 0.152s short relative to Perez.

There were no further changes among the front-runners, with Red Bull thus set to head into qualifying this evening with a dominant edge over its rivals, both in qualifying and race trim.

Hamilton and Russell, just behind, will likely be hard-pressed to challenge the bulls, while McLaren's Norris produced a solid lap to clock in fifth.

Leclerc and Sainz, battling front tyre wear, were P6 and P7 while Daniel Ricciardo, Vettel and Alex Albon completed the first half of the runners.

Both Alpines sat just outside the top-ten, with Ocon preceding Alonso in their final practice session together. Further back, Haas' Kevin Magnussen and Mick Schumacher preceded Alfa's Zhou Guanbu and Nicholas Latifi closed out the field.

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