Sebastian Vettel was the fastest man in the third free practice. The German was leading Alonso, Massa and Webber in the final session before qualifying.

The third free practice started at 11:00 local time and conditions were similar to yesterday's sessions. The air temperature was 26 degrees Celsius and the track was 34 degrees. Everybody began the session with an installation lap to see if everything works like yesterday. 15 minutes into the session the drivers began doing flying laps. The first to set a 'fast' time was Jaime Alguersuari. The Spaniard missed the second session yesterday and was looking to get a lot of laps today.

Times started to tumble as the top competitors started their runs. Alonso quickly beat the fastest time with a 1:39.743. He was followed by Massa, Rosberg, Heidfeld and Hamilton. The Red Bull drivers didn't start doing laps until the session passed the halfway point. When they did do their laps they led immediately. Vettel did the lap in 1:38.694 and Webber completed the Valencia lap in 1:39.285. Both Webber and Vettel did their times on the white medium tyre.

The first to change to the soft tyres were the Mercedes GP drivers. The gap between the compounds seems to be 1.5 seconds. Nico Rosberg jumped immediately from a 1:40.182 to a 1:38.580. Michael Schumacher was a little slower and did the lap in 1:38.799. In the last part of the session Alonso and Massa took the lead with their soft tyres fitted. Alonso was the quickest of the two and did a 1:37.678. It wasn't enough though. Vettel was more than four tenths quicker on his qualifying simulation run. The German finished the session as fastest with a 1:37.258.