Oscar Piastri led a comfortable McLaren one-two ahead of teammate Lando Norris in the final practice session of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, with title rivals Ferrari nearly half a second off the pace.

The final hour of practice of the season was a subdued affair, late afternoon conditions were not representative of today’s nighttime qualifying or Sunday’s twilight race, and the ambient temperature rose to about 104 degrees F.

After a few initial exploratory laps, Piastri set the pace with 1:23.433 minutes on a new set of soft tires, beating his teammate Norris by 0.193 seconds. In doing so, he reversed the order of McLaren’s double victory in FP2 on Friday evening.

Lewis Hamilton unexpectedly ended up in third place after improving in a second run with a used set of soft brake pads, although he was still 0.39 seconds off the pace, while Max Verstappen complained about a lack of bite from his front brakes The pace in the fourth was 0.411 seconds behind.

The closest contender for the constructors’ championship Ferrari could muster was fifth with Carlos Sainz, who was 0.438 seconds slower than Piastri’s leading McLaren. Charles Leclerc, who had to take a ten-place grid penalty in the Grand Prix due to a battery change, was ninth and had a lead of 0.665 seconds.

“We are nowhere. Nowhere,” Leclerc said over team radio when told of his gap to the lead.

George Russell was in a confused sixth place, the Mercedes driver 0.642 seconds off the pace and around 0.2 seconds behind the leading five cars. The Brit, who started from pole position at last weekend’s Qatar Grand Prix, was baffled by his lack of speed.

“I’m not sure what’s going on,” he radioed at the start of the session. “The car feels good, just very slow.

“I really don’t know why the pace is so bad. Everything feels somewhat normal, it’s just that everything is slow.”

Nico Hülkenberg and Kevin Magnussen were close together, the Haas teammates were separated by just 0.001 seconds and were less than 0.02 seconds slower than Russell. The German and the Dane prevailed ahead of Leclerc, who was 0.004 seconds behind.

Sergio Perez completed the top 10 in Red Bull Racing’s second car, being 0.85 seconds off the pace and 0.439 seconds slower than his teammate Verstappen.

Yuki Tsunoda finished 11th for RB at the front of an extremely tight group of eight cars with a time span of less than 0.2 seconds.

Alex Albon took his Williams to 12th place and just 0.035 seconds off the pace, followed by Pierre Gasly for Alpine a further 0.03 seconds off the pace.

Jack Doohan, who teased that he had left plenty of time on Friday to prepare for qualifying smoothly, improved hugely compared to his teammate overnight, going just 0.026 seconds slower than Gasly.

Valtteri Bottas was 16th ahead of Liam Lawson and Lance Stroll, the trio separated by 0.052 seconds.

Zhou Guanyu was 19th and 1.235 seconds off the pace, the Chinese driver was around 0.1 seconds ahead of Williams newcomer Franco Colapinto at the back of the field.