Bahrain GP: Vettel leads Ferrari 1-2 in final practice

The German posted the best time of the session with a 1:31.683 lap on supersofts, finishing 0.040s ahead of teammate Kimi Raikkonen.

Vettel's time, however, was over six tenths slower than the benchmark set by Nico Rosberg yesterday.

The Mercedes driver settled for third position, four tenths behind Vettel, with teammate Lewis Hamilton down in fourth.

Valtteri Bottas completed the top five in the Williams, an impressive Romain Grosjean putting the Haas in sixth position ahead of the grid-deciding session.

Daniil Kvyat finished seventh in the fastest Red Bull, with Esteban Gutierrez (Haas), Felipe Massa (Williams) and Daniel Ricciardo in the second Red Bull completing the top 10.

Story of the session

Ricciardo was the first drive to register a time, 10 minutes in, as Jenson Button appeared to hit trouble right at the start of the session.

The McLaren driver, a surprising third yesterday, reported his engine was sounding different and returned to the pits, his mechanics starting work on the car straight away.

Although Button was able to return to the track quickly, teammate Stoffel Vandoorne was not so lucky, the Belgian's car suffering an oil leak that kept him in the garage for most of the session.

Sergio Perez soon relegated Ricciardo to second as the front-runners took their time to jump onto the track.

As it has been the norm this weekend, Rosberg needed just a single lap to move to the top of the times, 20 minutes into the session.

The German's 1:33.150 lap was matched by Hamilton, who set the exact same time a few seconds later.

The Mercedes duo were first outpaced by Bottas using the supersofts and a moment later by Raikkonen, who put the Ferrari on top with a run of softs.

The qualifying simulations kicked off with some 10 minutes to go, Rosberg immediately shooting to the top with a 1:32.104 on supersofts.

Hamilton again fell short and was less than a tenth slower than his teammate.

But Raikkonen put an end to Mercedes' dominance with his first run on supersofts, the Ferrari driver setting a new benchmark with the first lap of the session in the 1m31s.

Vettel made it a Ferrari one-two as he outpaced Raikkonen by 0.040s with less than seven minutes to go.

The session ended with a puncture for Renault's Jolyon Palmer, who had to drive slowly back to the pits.

Pos	Driver	Team	Time	Gap	Laps
1	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1:31.683		22
2	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	1:31.723	+0.040	13
3	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1:32.104	+0.421	18
4	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:32.160	+0.477	14
5	Valtteri Bottas	Williams	1:32.675	+0.992	18
6	Romain Grosjean	Haas F1 Team	1:33.082	+1.399	14
7	Daniil Kvyat	Red Bull Racing	1:33.113	+1.430	10
8	Esteban Gutierrez	Haas F1 Team	1:33.337	+1.654	14
9	Felipe Massa	Williams	1:33.363	+1.680	18
10	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull Racing	1:33.519	+1.836	20
11	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber	1:33.569	+1.886	16
12	Kevin Magnussen	Renault F1 Team	1:33.617	+1.934	9
13	Jenson Button	McLaren	1:33.704	+2.021	12
14	Stoffel Vandoorne	McLaren	1:33.744	+2.061	11
15	Max Verstappen	Toro Rosso	1:33.778	+2.095	20
16	Carlos Sainz Jr.	Toro Rosso	1:34.003	+2.320	20
17	Felipe Nasr	Sauber	1:34.013	+2.330	15
18	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India	1:34.128	+2.445	16
19	Sergio Perez	Force India	1:34.281	+2.598	15
20	Jolyon Palmer	Renault F1 Team	1:34.424	+2.741	9
21	Rio Haryanto	Manor Racing MRT	1:35.546	+3.863	15
22	Pascal Wehrlein	Manor Racing MRT	1:35.724	+4.041	16