F1 LIVE | Follow the FP3 of the Bahrain GP in Malaysia here

On Friday, the weekend began with Max Verstappen setting the pace in FP1, where the Dutchman was more than three and a half tenths of a second quicker than George Russell, and around eight tenths of a second quicker than his teammate Isack Hadjar and Charles Leclerc.

The second free practice session was a lot closer. Charles Leclerc set the best time with a 1:37.5, with Hadjar and Lando Norris completing the top three. Only around five tenths of a second separated the top eight drivers.

In terms of the battle for the drivers' title, Russell managed to cut the gap to Kimi Antonelli after a stunning performance at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. The gap currently stands at 66 points, but it could have been even smaller if the Italian had failed to recover to fifth place in Baku after his crash in qualifying. Hamilton is currently in third place, 103 points behind Antonelli.

Red Bull Racing's Technical Director, Pierre Waché, believes that the Milton Keynes-based team could seemingly extract more from the updates first fitted to the RB22 for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

The Frenchman said: "The track surface was extremely dusty, and the grip evolved a lot throughout the day, but we made a good start in the opening session, evaluating the package we brought to Baku and focusing on different types of corners, particularly in the low speed. Overall, it seems to be working better than what we brought last weekend."

Together with Verstappen, George Russell named the McLarens as pace-setters in Malaysia. The Mercedes driver commented: "I think at the moment, Verstappen's looking the quickest in single lap, and McLaren are looking the quickest in the long runs."