F2 | Bahrain Test: Maloney also ends the last day in the lead

The third and final day of the Formula 2 pre-season tests in Bahrain also went to the archives and, also in this case, always in the name of Zane Maloney. After the best time set on the second day, the Barbadian driver confirmed himself as the fastest in Tuesday's session too, setting the fastest time in the final minutes.

As already seen yesterday, the morning of the last day was also mainly dedicated to long distance tests, with rather high times, so much so that the best time was that set by Isack Hadjar in the first half hour. His teammate Josep Martí scored a one-two for Campos, finishing around two tenths of a second behind.

With the long runs and race stints that characterized the first session, most drivers did not make much improvement. Andrea Kimi Antonelli took his PREMA Racing to fifth position in the last hour of the session, the hottest one, placing himself behind Trident's Roman Stanek. Great work over the long distance for the Italian, who after being the one who had completed the fewest laps in the afternoon session of the second day, this morning put together 48 laps, one of the most active results ever. Good work also for Gabriel Bortoleto, who put together 44 laps in a row.

In the afternoon session, the Brazilian from Invicta immediately took the lead, setting a 1:43.435 and preceding Antonelli by half a second. PREMA's Italian teammate Oliver Bearman improved shortly afterwards, taking the pair to second and third in the overall standings, 0.172 and 0.360 seconds behind Bortoleto respectively.

With just over an hour and a half to go, Hadjar was back in the top five with a time of 1:44.430. Towards the final hour of testing, the Frenchman took the lead again, clocking a 1:42.712.

In the last 60 minutes of testing, Richard Verschoor rose to third place with a 1:43.201, but only in the last 10 minutes did more interesting times begin to arrive, exactly as they had already seen in the afternoon session of the second day. Ritomo Miyata, then Jak Crawford and finally Zane Maloney took turns at the top, with the latter lapping in 1:42.468 to move into first place. Although the times in the tests are relative, for the Japanese driver from Rodin, in his first experience in a European series, it was a good afternoon, with 34 laps completed.

The Barbadian driver thus proved to be the fastest, even if the times were well behind those recorded on the second day, when the limit of 41 and a half was reached. The lack of tires also weighed on the times despite the rain on Sunday, given that the teams used them for a long time for long-distance tests.

Twelfth time for Bortoleto, who also proved to be among the most active in the afternoon, completing 48 laps, which add to the 44 in the morning for a total of 92 laps: an excellent result for a rookie looking for the best pace. Antonelli continued the work of setting up and studying the compounds, completing 32 laps, three less than his teammate Bearman, who finished in sixteenth place.

Once pre-season testing is complete, Formula 2 will return to Sakhir for the first round of the championship from 29 February to 2 March.