After the third free practice session had already been halted briefly by Fernando Alonso’s crash, Sergio Perez caused the second red flag of the session with about seven minutes to go.
The Mexican went out with brand new red tyres just before the end of the session, to do a qualifying simulation like many other drivers. This only went wrong for Perez. The Red Bull Racing driver lost his car on his fast lap and ended up in the wall.
The marshals tried hard to clear the track quickly to create a few more minutes of track time for the remaining drivers. With two minutes to go, the track was cleared again. This caused chaos as everyone wanted to quickly test the soft tyre before qualifying.
