Valtteri Bottas finished on top of the time charts at the 2021 Qatar Grand Prix in the third free practice session. Lewis Hamilton finished in second position with Max Verstappen in third position at the end of the session.

The sixty-minute long third free practice session started under sunny conditions at the Losail International Circuit with air temperatures at 27 degrees C and track temperatures at 38 degrees C.

The Pirelli tyre choice at this race is the white-striped hard compound tyres (C1), yellow-striped medium compound tyres (C2), and red-striped soft compound tyres (C3), the hardest compounds in the Pirelli tyre range.

The two Uralkali Haas F1 Team drivers, Nikita Mazepin and Mick Schumacher were the first drivers on the track. Mazepin missed the entire second free practice session as his chassis was changed.

Mazepin stopped at the end of the pitlane and briefly brought out the red flags as his car was retrieved.

Esteban Ocon set the first timed lap with a lap time of 1m24.864s. Fernando Alonso on the medium compound tyres went fastest with a lap time of 1m23.904s.

Hamilton went fastest on the soft compound tyres, 0.235 seconds faster than Bottas.

Verstappen finally came out of the garage with less than thirty-five minutes to go, the Dutchman went fastest with a lap time of 1m23.121s. Verstappen was just 0.031 seconds faster than arch-rival Hamilton at this stage.

Carlos Sainz, Bottas and Pierre Gasly were the drivers behind the top two drivers.

With less than twenty minutes to go, Bottas topped the timesheets with a lap of 1m22.573s, just 0.082s quicker than Hamilton. Verstappen was in third position 0.412 seconds behind Bottas.

With less than fifteen minutes to go in the session, the drivers bolted on a brand new set of soft compound tyres to make final qualification simulation runs.

Verstappen was again sat in the garage as mechanics were looking at his rear-wing as the top part of the wing was flapping when the DRS opened.

Charles Leclerc had a spin at Turn 2 on his first run. The two Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team drivers led by Bottas were on top of the time charts with Bottas 0.078 seconds faster than Hamilton. Pérez went third fastest behind them.

With less than five minutes to go, Verstappen finally came out of the garage and on his first flying lap went third fastest, 0.341 seconds behind Bottas.

The session ended with Bottas leading a Mercedes 1-2. Verstappen and Sergio Pérez were in third and fifth positions with Gasly splitting the two Red Bull Racing drivers.

Sainz was in sixth position with team-mate Leclerc in ninth position. The two Alpine F1 team drivers, Alonso and Ocon were in seventh and eighth positions.

Yuki Tsunoda rounded off the top ten positions at the end of the session.

The qualification session will take place under very different conditions under the lights. It is advantage Mercedes at the end of this session, but it is going to be a very close qualification session.

2021 Qatar Grand Prix FP3 Results:

Pos	No	Driver	Nat.	Team	Time	Gap	Laps
1	77	Valtteri Bottas	FIN	Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team	1:22.310		17
2	44	Lewis Hamilton	GBR	Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team	1:22.388	+0.078s	16
3	33	Max Verstappen	NED	Red Bull Racing	1:22.651	+0.341s	10
4	10	Pierre Gasly	FRA	Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda	1:22.835	+0.525s	17
5	11	Sergio Perez	MEX	Red Bull Racing	1:22.846	+0.536s	14
6	55	Carlos Sainz	ESP	Scuderia Ferrari	1:23.048	+0.738s	17
7	14	Fernando Alonso	ESP	Alpine F1 Team	1:23.186	+0.876s	13
8	31	Esteban Ocon	FRA	Alpine F1 Team	1:23.209	+0.899s	18
9	16	Charles Leclerc	MON	Scuderia Ferrari	1:23.276	+0.966s	17
10	22	Yuki Tsunoda	JAP	Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda	1:23.567	+1.257s	20
11	3	Daniel Ricciardo	AUS	McLaren F1 Team	1:23.711	+1.401s	14
12	5	Sebastian Vettel	GER	Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team	1:23.884	+1.574s	17
13	4	Lando Norris	GBR	McLaren F1 Team	1:23.895	+1.585s	16
14	63	George Russell	GBR	Williams Racing	1:23.923	+1.613s	17
15	18	Lance Stroll	CAN	Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team	1:24.154	+1.844s	17
16	7	Kimi Räikkönen	FIN	Alfa Romeo Racing ORLEN	1:24.246	+1.936s	19
17	99	Antonio Giovinazzi	ITA	Alfa Romeo Racing ORLEN	1:24.288	+1.978s	17
18	6	Nicholas Latifi	CAN	Williams Racing	1:24.499	+2.189s	15
19	47	Mick Schumacher	GER	Uralkali Haas F1 Team	1:24.680	+2.370s	20
20	9	Nikita Mazepin	RAF	Uralkali Haas F1 Team			1