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Sebastian Vettel has ended the final practice session on top, making it a clean sweep for Ferrari for finishing on top in the three practice sessions. Vettel's fastest lap was a 1:34.001 which is clear of the record for the fastest lap set at the Sochi Autodrom.
Vettel was three-tenths of a second ahead of his teammate Kimi Raikkonen, and the two Mercedes' followed suit with Valtteri Bottas ahead of Lewis Hamilton. The gap between Ferrari and Mercedes was slashed today, but Bottas was still three and a half tenths down on Vettel.
The fastest times were not set on the first timed lap on the Pirelli tyres, but instead they took a couple of laps to warm up, which could make qualifying very busy.
Red Bull ended their practice programme in fifth and eighth with Max Verstappen ahead of Daniel Ricciardo. Ricciardo hit some problems near the end of the session and was parked trackside before getting it going again. Felipe Massa and Nico Hulkenberg split the two Red Bulls in sixth and seventh place.
Carlos Sainz looked strong and ended his session P9, while his teammate Daniil Kvyat struggled with his set-up, and could only slot in P13. Kevin Magnussen rounded out the top ten in his Haas.
Lance Stroll was just outside the top ten in eleventh, ahead of Esteban Ocon who was twelfth. Ocon was three-tenths faster than more experienced teammate Sergio Perez who finished in fifteenth. Fernando Alonso and Stoffel Vandoorne ended practice for McLaren in P14 and P17 respectively.
Marcus Ericsson and Pascal Wehrlein look to be struggling in the Sauber as they were once again the slowest of the timed runners. Jolyon Palmer failed to set a lap at all, continuing a torrid start to the season. Renault will change his power unit before qualifying.
Fergal Walsh
Sochi Autodrom - 29 April 2017
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Posts: 1,804
Quali should be close, it'd be a shame if Mercedes were actually sandbagging