The seven-time world champion was 0.214s quicker than Verstappen during the soft tyre runs 🅠ahead of a crucial qualifying session at the Yas Marina Circuit in their winner-takes-all championship showdown. 

Both championship contenders aborted laps following lock ups, with Hamilton reporting overheating rear tyres and Verstappen struggling with balance issues on his Red Bull.&nbs꧅p;

“It just doesn’t fucking Turn at Turn 6, it’s unbelievable,” Verstappen reported after a lock up on his first e๊ffort on the soft tyres. 

Red Bull also faced a 🌊r♛eoccurence of its DRS issue in FP3, with the team seen changing Verstappen's rear-wing due to reliability concerns.  

For the second week in a row during a practice session, H💎amilton unintentionally blocked Haas driver Nikita Mazepin. The incident occurred as Hamilton exited the pits, with Mazepin fꦛorced to take evasive action at Turn 3. 

Valtteri Bottas was third-fastest but ended up 0.751s adrift of his Mercedes te🍌ammate during the qualifying simulation runs. 

Red Bull’s Sergio Perez took fourth ahead of Lando Norris’s McLaren, while the AlphaTauri pair of Yuki Tsunoda and💎 Pierre Gasly continued their strong form in ꦆAbu Dhabi to take sixth and seventh. 

Completing the top 10 order were Ferra🌳ri’s Carlos Sainz, the McLaren of Daniel Ricciardo, and Charles Leclerc. 

Qualifying for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix t💦akes place at 5pm local time (1pm GMT).