Formula 1

Max Verstappen tops Saturday practice, but Mercedes still a threat

Published Nov. 15, 2016 1:56 p.m. ET

Samuel Reiman

Red Bull Racing’s Max Verstappen topped the timing sheets Saturday morning with a best lap of 1:36.766 around Circuit of The Americas in Austin.

However, the Mercedes teammates were close behind despite turning their best laps on the soft tires, as opposed to the supersofts, in order to double-check that they can make it through Q2 on the softs. The key, of course, is that those who make it into Q3 have to start the race on the tires that they set their Q2 time on, and the supersoft is not a desired tire for the race.

However, Red Bull still has a reason to be optimistic given their long-run pace in the Friday afternoon practice session.

Behind Verstappen in FP3 was his Australian teammate Daniel Ricciardo, with Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen in third ahead of the two Mercedes cars of Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton. Rosberg and Hamilton both went out for a run on the supersofts in the closing moments of the session but did not improve on their times, as Rosberg aborted his lap and Hamilton hit traffic.

Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel could only manage sixth fastest, and had suffered from a loss of power during the middle of the session. There was also drama for Manor driver Pascal Wehrlein, who brought out the red flag when he spun into the gravel, and for Toro Rosso’s Carlos Sainz, who suffered from two punctures – the first on his right rear, and the second on the left rear.

Click HERE for full practice results

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