Third free practice, Hungary: Norris ahead of Hamilton, Verstappen P7, Hülkenberg P10

The final practice session for the 22 Formula 1 drivers ahead of the final practice session for the traditional Hungarian Grand Prix; the last chance to gauge the car’s handling in a qualifying simulation; the last chance to fine-tune the car’s behaviour in race trim.

The conditions at the Hungaroring: 24.6 degrees, track temperature at 49.2 degrees – significantly higher than on the first day of practice; the wind had changed direction again compared to Friday, meaning different conditions and, consequently, plenty of brainpower required from drivers and engineers. The wind was now a tailwind through Turn 1; on Friday it had been exactly the opposite.

The track was also different from Friday: the tarmac in Turn 1 had been ground down because the cars were bottoming out too much, whilst the final corner before the start-finish line needed retouching because the rear wheels were scraping the surface. Hopefully this won’t lead to a repeat of the track surface breaking up, as happened in Monaco at the start of June.

Good news for Aston Martin: Lance Stroll’s race car (suspension failure on Friday, crash) has been repaired and fitted with a new power unit and the same Evo components as Fernando Alonso’s car.

The team are still not revealing exactly what went wrong; they’ve merely confirmed a mechanical issue, which is now said to have been resolved.

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First man out on the track: Franco Colapinto, who had driven his Alpine off the track on Friday. World Sports Car Champion Anthony Davidson: “Going out so early in this situation is purely about rebuilding confidence.”

One driver who didn’t take to the track for the time being was Arvid Lindblad in the Racing Bulls’ car. The power unit was playing up; whilst warming it up, the technicians had spotted some data they didn’t like, suggesting either an electronic or an electrical problem.

There was also a problem with the Racing Bulls’ second car, driven by Liam Lawson – again related to the power unit – which even forced the mechanics to break their mandated night’s rest.

After a quarter of an hour, the top cars finally took to the track: McLaren driver Oscar Piastri was faster than Leclerc and Hamilton in their Ferraris, followed by Nico Hülkenberg in the Audi. Hamilton reported that he had a drop-down visor that was caught on the rear wing.

Then last year’s winner, Lando Norris, moved into the lead before a red flag had to be shown: yet another rear brake failure on a Cadillac, this time on Sergio Pérez’s car; the Mexican pulled his car over at Turn 2.

Almost at the same time, Aston Martin star Fernando Alonso had his hands full trying not to crash into the rear of his team-mate Lance Stroll, who had been driving as if he were on the track all by himself. Shortly afterwards, a part flew off Alonso’s car.

Reliable brakes are essential at the Hungaroring (among other things): we’ve got six brutal braking manoeuvres here. Cadillac has already had several brake problems this season (Bottas in Monaco and Austria, Pérez also at the Red Bull Ring).

After a six-minute break, proceedings resumed at 12.56 pm, now also featuring the Mercedes duo of Antonelli and Russell, as well as Max Verstappen.

Verstappen was held up on his fast lap, so he finished only P3 behind Norris and Isack Hadjar. Shortly afterwards, Leclerc moved into third ahead of Verstappen.

Mercedes had an answer: Russell moved up to P2, but championship leader Antonelli messed up the first section of the track, forcing the Italian to make a fresh attempt. Another fast lap was disallowed because he strayed too far off the track.

Then joy for the Tifosi: Lewis Hamilton took the lead from Norris, and Max Verstappen was also able to step up – moving up to P4 behind Hamilton, Norris and Piastri, followed by Russell, Leclerc, Lawson and the Audis of Hülkenberg and Bortoleto.

With 25 minutes to go, Leclerc moved into first place, almost four tenths of a second faster than Hamilton.

Kimi Antonelli finally found his pace: P2, sandwiched between the Ferraris. He took four tenths off Russell (in P8 at the time) – ouch! Russell had botched his attempt with smoking tyres in the first corner.

Kimi asked his team to take a closer look at the car. “I went wide in Turn 4.” Sure enough, the experts found a loss of downforce; it seemed a few aerodynamic components had broken.

But it can’t have been that bad, because with 15 minutes to go in the session, Kimi overtook Antonelli to take the lead, truly in harmony with his car for the first time, two tenths ahead of Piastri in the McLaren.

World Champion Lando Norris did even better: 48 thousandths ahead of Antonelli. Max Verstappen moved up to P4, despite a messy lap.

Russell couldn’t improve, finishing more than six tenths behind Antonelli in P6.

Ferrari had the last word: Leclerc moved up to P3, 85 thousandths behind leader Norris, then came Hamilton – fastest lap! 150 thousandths ahead of Norris. But Lando still had an ace up his sleeve and reclaimed the lead!

Ferrari, McLaren, Mercedes – we can look forward to a thrilling battle in qualifying.