Raikkonen tops final free practice at Spa-Francorchamps

F1 Grand Prix, GP Belgium, Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps

Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel were atop the timesheet of the final free practice session ahead of qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix, later today. Mercedes' Lewis Hamilton was however extremely close in third position.

The Finnish Ferrari driver had already topped FP1 and once again found himself fastest, on a circuit he is particularly fond of.

In a session where all cars ran the ultrasofts at one moment or another to prepare for qualifying, Raikkonen topped his Ferrari team mate by 2 tenths of a second. Weather remained particularly favourable throughout the session too, with similar conditions expected for qualifying in the afternoon.

The early pace was set by Hamilton on the super soft Pirelli tyres, but that situation rapidly changed when both Ferraris opted for one additional lap on the same set of supersofts, resulting in faster times for both, with Raikkonen having the edge on Vettel.

When they all switched to ultrasofts, Hamilton was unable to get back on top of the Ferraris, and saw Raikkonen end up fastest as well, mainly thanks to setting the best second sector, one that is known for its series of high speed corners, contrary to the longer full throttle sections that are contained in S1 and S3.

Behind Hamilton in third, the gap was wide as Verstappen was more than a second down on the pace setter, but still ahead of Valtteri Bottas and Daniel Ricciardo as they completed the top 6 positions.

Jolyon Palmer came a strong 7th for Renault and quite a bit fastest than his team mate Hulkenberg as well., ahead of Sergio Perez, Carlos Sainz and Fernando Alonso.

There was trouble for Kvyat, whose Toro Rosso stopped with a loss of power and a small engine fire on the Kemmel straight halfway into the session.

Sauber's Markus Ericsson didn't get further than 6 laps in the 60-minute session.