Practice 3 Report - Split Decision

Daniel Ricciardo split the Mercedes cars during Free Practice 3 for the Monaco Grand Prix. Lewis Hamilton was fastest overall with a time of 1:16.758. Ricciardo was just 0.050 of a second slower in his Red Bull. Hamilton's Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg wound up third with a lap of 1:16.874, while Ricciardo's teammate Sebastian Vettel wound up fourth with a 1:17.184.

The ambient temperature at the start of the session was 66 degrees Fahrenheit (19 degrees Centigrade) and the track temperature was 75 degrees Fahrenheit (24 degrees Centigrade.)

After a day off, the drivers were keen to get back into action on Saturday. The mechanics, of course, still had to work on Friday but not quite their usual long hours.

Once things had settled down after the initial scramble out of the pits and early laps, Nico Rosberg put his Mercedes to the top of the timing screens with a time of 1:17.736. Teammate Lewis Hamilton was just 0.130 of a second slower with a lap of 1:17.866. Next came the Red Bull boys with Sebastian Vettel ahead of Daniel Ricciardo. The latter complained over the radio that they had gone the wrong way on the set-up and the car did not feel as connected as it had on Thursday.

Ferrari's Fernando Alonso and McLaren's Kevin Magnussen rounded out the top six midway through the 60-minute session.

Other than Marcus Ericsson sliding straight on at Turn 1, the first half of FP3 had been pretty quiet.

Up until now the drivers had been on Pirelli's soft compound slicks with the yellow sidewalls. Romain Grosjean, however, tried out the super softs on his Lotus and jumped up to sixth.

With minutes remaining in the session, Rosberg cut his time down to 1:17.351.

With 18 minutes remaining in the session, Ricciardo was out on the super soft tires did a lap of 1:18.961, but on his next tour he clocked a 1:16.808 to take top spot. His next lap was 1:17.177.

With 12 minutes remaining in the session, Sergio Perez, on super softs, moves his Force India into third.

Now more drivers were trying out the super softs including Nico Hulkenberg who grabbed fifth place in his Force India.

Then Vettel clocked a 1:17.208 to move up to second.

With 8 minutes remaining in the session, Hamilton tried out the super softs. And now all but a couple of drivers were on the super softs. Hamilton set a 1:16.758.

With 5 minutes remaining in the session, only Ricciardo was in the pits.

With 2 minutes remaining in the session, the order was Hamilton, Ricciardo, Vettel, Rosberg, Perez and Hamilton.

With 1 minute remaining in the session, Rosberg moved to third with a 1:16.874.

With 22 seconds remaining in the session, all 22 drivers were on the track.

And when it was all over, the top six at the end of FP3 were: Hamilton, Ricciardo, Rosberg, Vettel, Alonso, Kimi Raikkonen (Ferrari), Perez, Hulkenberg and Toro Rosso teammates Jean-Eric Vergne and Daniil Kvyat.