Verstappen led all scorers in the final practise session before the Spanish Grand Prix due to the weather.

 

Verstappen led all scorers in the final practise session before the Spanish Grand Prix due to the weather.

Verstappen led all scorers in the final practise session before the Spanish Grand Prix due to the weather.

Max Verstappen, the current leader in the championship, outran Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez to post the quickest time in the first dry lap of a wet final practise for the Spanish Grand Prix.

Teams prepared for bad weather as thunderstorms moved quickly towards Barcelona from the northern Pyrenees.

On dry-weather tyres, the session got underway, but raindrops were soon observed around the Circuit of Barcelona-Catalunya.

The drivers' regular run plans for FP3 were completely disrupted as a result, with everyone leaving the pits as soon as the green flag flew to get some valuable dry running in.

The majority of drivers immediately began a single-lap timed run to get ready for qualifying, with Red Bull's Max Verstappen leading teammate Sergio Perez by 0.250 seconds with Mercedes' Lewis Hamilton and George Russell following closely behind.

Soon after dividing the Mercedes drivers, local favourites Carlos Sainz and Fernando Alonso finished fourth and fifth, respectively.

At the 10-minute mark, the anticipated rain showers arrived as expected, initially hitting the final section that had been restored.

Logan Sargeant of Williams, who initially corrected a slide but then veered off into the gravel, appeared to be caught out by moisture in the already extremely fast final righter-hander.

As he lightly touched the wall, Sargeant avoided significant damage to the left side, but as the rain grew heavier, the red flag ended any further advancements.

The session resumed after a nine-minute delay, but it wasn't until almost a half-hour that drivers began to irregularly go out on a wet track.

While the rain seemed to be ceasing, McLaren's Lando Norris took on the responsibility of performing a reconnaissance lap on the intermediates to assess the situation.

With 22 minutes remaining, the majority of other drivers followed Norris' lead since any intermediate running may prove to be very valuable for Sunday's grand prix and Saturday afternoon's qualifying because more rain was possibly on the way.

In the closing moments, Pierre Gasly lost control at Turn 7 and Lance Stroll ventured through the gravel at Turn 6 while driving an intermediate.

Others switched back to Pirelli's soft slicks, eventually approaching dry weather times.

Verstappen's time at the top, ahead of Perez, Hamilton, Sainz, and Alonso, was never in doubt despite the first two sectors drying out.

Following a single hot lap in the dry, Russell finished sixth ahead of Leclerc, with Alfa Romeo's Valtteri Bottas, Yuki Tsunoda of AlphaTauri, and Norris filling out the top 10.

Alfa Romeo's Zhou finished 11th, followed by Nyck de Vries, Stroll from Aston Martin, and Nico Hulkenberg's first Haas in 14th.