Hamilton 0.4s clear in final practice at Monza

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Lewis Hamilton extended his advantage over team-mate Nico Rosberg during the final practice session for the Italian Grand Prix.

The championship leader - who was in confident mood after improvements on Friday - set the pace with a 1:22.008 on the supersoft tyre, setting the fastest three sectors as he dominated FP3. Rosberg was 0.393s adrift of his team-mate as the two Mercedes drivers completed their qualifying simulations before their rivals.

AS IT HAPPENED: Italian Grand Prix - FP3

With the benchmark set, the likes of Ferrari and Red Bull could not get close to the defending champions, with Sebastian Vettel third quickest but some 0.9s off the pace set by Hamilton. Kimi Raikkonen was fourth but some 1.1s slower than the fastest time, as Mercedes showed better performance on the supersoft tyre than it had at the same stage of the weekend in Belgium.

Raikkonen did manage to match his best time with a second flying lap immediately after his first, suggesting Ferrari is still unsure how to best prepare its tyres after Pirelli lowered tyre pressures slightly overnight to 23.0 PSI front and 20.5 PSI rear. It also remains to be seen how much added performance Ferrari's power unit gives when all the engines are turned up in qualifying.

Red Bull struggled somewhat as the two Williams drivers finished the session in fifth and sixth places ahead of Daniel Ricciardo and Max Verstappen. Once again Verstappen was on the receiving end of criticism after blocking Rosberg early in the session, and later the Dutch driver complained "the car is moving around way too much".

Sergio Perez and Esteban Gutierrez rounded out the top ten, with Haas looking capable of challenging for a spot in Q3 as one of three teams - including Force India and McLaren - covered by less than 0.2s. Only Gutierrez enjoyed a clean session for the team, however, as Romain Grosjean spun off after just four laps.

Grosjean's spin came at the Ascari chicane, keeping the car out of the barriers but getting stuck in the gravel, ending his session after 12 minutes. Grosjean ended the session 14th despite that error, one position ahead of Jolyon Palmer who went off at Parabolica late on and did well to keep his car out of the barrier.

Having looked quick for sections of the session, the two Manor drivers ended FP3 slowest - with Pascal Wehrlein just ahead of Esteban Ocon - but just 1.3s covered fifth to 22nd as the midfield remained closely matched on performance.

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Pos	Driver	Team	Time	Laps
01	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:22.008	14
02	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1:22.401	17
03	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1:22.946	13
04	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	1:23.149	12
05	Valtteri Bottas	Williams	1:23.500	20
06	Felipe Massa	Williams	1:23.647	19
07	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull	1:23.709	23
08	Max Verstappen	Red Bull	1:23.740	21
09	Sergio Perez	Force India	1:23.917	20
10	Esteban Gutierrez	Haas	1:24.034	15
11	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India	1:24.041	21
12	Jenson Button	McLaren	1:24.104	11
13	Carlos Sainz	Toro Rosso	1:24.240	17
14	Romain Grosjean	Haas	1:24.463	4
15	Jolyon Palmer	Renault	1:24.533	13
16	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber	1:24.542	20
17	Fernando Alonso	McLaren	1:24.658	12
18	Felipe Nasr	Sauber	1:24.715	19
19	Kevin Magnussen	Renault	1:24.793	12
20	Daniil Kvyat	Toro Rosso	1:24.845	17
21	Pascal Wehrlein	Manor	1:24.893	19
22	Esteban Ocon	Manor	1:24.938	15

Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.