Verstappen fastest as British teenager Bearman makes impressive F1 debut

Max Verstappen was quickest in final practice at the Saudi Arabian GP where Zhou Guanyu had a big crash for Sauber and Britain's Oliver Bearman made his first appearance for Ferrari.

Reigning world champion Verstappen bolted on a set of soft tyres – the Red Bull driver running just two sets of the red-walled tyres during the one-hour of running – to clock a 1m28.412s.

That was 0.146s clear of Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc – who has a temporary team mate for the rest of the weekend with reserve Oliver Bearman standing in for Carlos Sainz who has appendicitis.

Bearman, who was due to start the F2 race on pole for Prema before relinquishing that role for this weekend, delivered an assured performance after his late call-up, the Briton finishing 10th quickest.

Bearman became Ferrari's youngest ever rookie after regular driver Carlos Sainz had appendix surgery at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix on Friday.

Ferrari said Sainz, third in the Bahrain season-opener last weekend and the last driver to beat dominant Red Bull with victory in Singapore last September, was out of surgery and resting in hospital.

Bearman, who will race on Saturday aged 18 years and 306 days, is reserve for Ferrari and Ferrari-powered Haas and would have been competing for the Prema team in Formula Two at the Jeddah Corniche circuit.

The Briton had qualified on pole position for the feature race in the feeder series, his fourth F2 pole, and said afterwards that Jeddah was one of his favourite tracks.

He is the 97th Ferrari Formula One driver and the first to make his debut with the sport's oldest, most successful and glamorous team since Italian Arturo Merzario in 1972 at the British Grand Prix.

Bearman will also be the youngest Briton to start a Formula One championship race, taking the record of McLaren's Lando Norris who was 19 when he made his debut in 2019, and the 12th to race for Ferrari.

The last Briton to race in the Italian team's red overalls was Nigel Mansell in 1990.

Only two drivers, triple world champion Max Verstappen and Canadian Lance Stroll, have debuted at a younger age than Bearman.

The Chelmsford-born racer was 10th fastest in final practice after taking to the track with the number 38 on his car.

The number that has featured 12 times in the past on a Ferrari and one of those previous users was Britain's first champion Mike Hawthorn, who won his title with Ferrari in 1958.

Sainz had felt unwell on Wednesday, skipping his media duties, but took part in Thursday's two practice sessions for Saturday's race and clocked the seventh fastest time in the second one.

The Spaniard is leaving Ferrari at the end of the season with Mercedes' seven-times world champion Lewis Hamilton taking his seat next year.

Ferrari did not say when Sainz would return. The next race on the calendar is the Australian Grand Prix in two weeks' time.

• Sports