The Spaniard eked out a slender 0.05s margin over his team-mate as the Scuderia pair also dominated the lap count – combining to accrue more than 80 laps of data ahead of the Saturday race.
Sprint race polesitter Verstappen, meanwhile, was closer to two tenths adrift of the headline times but did appear to show the most impressive long-run pace, as the Alpines moved ahead of his team-mate Sergio Perez.
It was with 25 minutes of the hour remaining that the Ferraris surged towards the top of the timing screens as they bolted on a set of the fastest-available C5 soft tyres.
Leclerc buzzed the timing line in 1m08.660s to sit provisionally fastest and would not improve from there, as he dropped 0.9s over his next few laps to assess the durability of the red-walled tyre.
With 18 minutes to run, then Sainz laid down the benchmark for the session, completing the 2.68-mile lap in 1m08.610s to find five hundredths over Leclerc and top the times.
He was just two laps shy of Leclerc, 40 versus 42, but will start the sprint race from third place, one spot behind his team-mate, the Monegasque eclipsed in qualifying by Verstappen late on.
The defending champion ended the session third, dropping 0.168s adrift of the quickest Ferrari as Verstappen ended the practice running at Red Bull’s home track on a 1m08.778s.
Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB18
Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images
Verstappen had set the pace during the early part of the session, when there was a focus on race pace, although teams did split between targeting the sprint contest or full grand prix.
The Alfa Romeo, Haas and Aston Martin cars ventured out first in the hour-long morning run and were joined by the McLaren of Lando Norris, who gained an early tow from Leclerc across the line to post a 1m10.670s effort on medium tyres to initially head the pack.
Verstappen did not join the action until five minutes in, with Red Bull seemingly placing an emphasis on the sprint race simulation by running on softs while Ferrari kept medium tyres.
With the advantage of C5 compound, Verstappen’s first representative effort stopped the clock at 1m09.170s to surpass Sainz by 0.3s and Leclerc, then running in third place.
Verstappen then lowered that to a 1m09.067s to claw four tenths ahead and after being told to hold fifth gear between Turns 6 and 7, dipped into the 1m08s with a 1m08.966s effort.
That placed Verstappen 0.2s ahead of Sainz’s best early run as part of the race runs, with Leclerc 0.6s…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at Autosport.com – Formula 1 – Stories…