Max ninth in last Chinese free practice

Published on 11 April 2015 by Mike Motilall

Despite a decent ninth position in the last free practice on the track of Shanghai, Max Verstappen had a difficult session. The 17-year old Dutchman suffered some stability issues in his STR10 and reported a rear end that was sliding, predominantly in the slower corners.
On the medium compound tyres, Max held the number eleven spot for quite a while, until, just before the closing of the third free practice, he gets on the softer compound and notes the ninth time with a 1:39.274. His Scuderia Toro Rosso-team mate Carlos Sainz was a tenth quicker (P7).

Lewis Hamilton led the pack for the third time in a row in China. With a 1:37.615, the reigning World champion kept his Mercedes-team mate Nico Rosberg with two tenths at bay. The distance to the rest of the Formula 1-field, led by the Ferrari-duo, was huge. Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen followed respectively with a seven and ten second’s gap.

Fernando Alonso finished the one hour practice session after just about four minutes. A smoking McLaren forced him to shut down the car and report back to a still tormented team. Jenson Button was able to finish the session and eventually managed to get to P15.

But there were more drivers with issues. Felipe Massa was forced to terminate his run due to smoke in his Williams-cockpit and also Nico Hülkenberg (Force India) suffered the same problem. Apart from that Daniil Kvyat’s Red Bull had to deal with loss of power.

The drivers also took some little on track excursions. For a change, Max was also shown in that manner when, between turns eleven and twelve, he made a harmless little spin. Causing no damage, he was able to continue his way. Having done 19 laps in this free practice, he ended up being ninth.

Chinese Grand Prix – Shanghai International Circuit – Saturday 11 April

FREE PRACTICE 3 RESULTS 

P No Name  		Team 			Time 	 Gap   Laps 
 1 44 Lewis Hamilton 	Mercedes 		1:37.615       14 
 2  6 Nico Rosberg 	Mercedes 		1:37.841 0.226 16 
 3  5 Sebastian Vettel 	Ferrari 		1:38.313 0.698 17 
 4  7 Kimi Raikkonen 	Ferrari 		1:38.512 0.897 16 
 5  3 Daniel Ricciardo 	Red Bull Racing 	1:39.020 1.405 8 
 6 26 Daniil Kvyat 	Red Bull Racing 	1:39.106 1.491 14 
 7 55 Carlos Sainz 	Toro Rosso 		1:39.113 1.498 17 
 8 77 Valtteri Bottas 	Williams 		1:39.243 1.628 15 
 9 33 Max Verstappen 	Toro Rosso 		1:39.274 1.659 19 
10  8 Romain Grosjean 	Lotus 			1:39.405 1.790 14 
11 19 Felipe Massa      Williams 		1:39.410 1.795 17 
12 27 Nico Hulkenberg 	Force India 		1:39.513 1.898 14 
13  9 Marcus Ericsson 	Sauber 			1:39.559 1.944 18 
14 12 Felipe Nasr 	Sauber 			1:39.591 1.976 19 
15 22 Jenson Button 	McLaren 		1:39.694 2.079 16 
16 13 Pastor Maldonado 	Lotus 			1:39.766 2.151 16 
17 11 Sergio Perez 	Force India 		1:39.781 2.166 17 
18 28 Will Stevens 	Marussia 		1:42.928 5.313 15 
19 98 Roberto Merhi 	Marussia 		1:44.956 7.341 9 
20 14 Fernando Alonso 	McLaren 		No time        1

On Twitter and Facebook we'll keep you updated throughout the weekend followed by a full report on Verstappen.nl at the end of the day’s action. You can find the schedule for the Grand Prix here.