SAKHIR, Bahrain (AP) — Ferrari's Charles Leclerc was the fastest on the final day of Formula 1 testing in Bahrain on Friday.

McLaren's Lando Norris was 0.879 seconds behind Leclerc and Red Bull's Max Verstappen trailed by 1.117 seconds.

Mercedes' George Russell was fourth and Alpine's Pierre Gasly fifth.

Leclerc's pace backed up the belief that Ferrari will be a leading contender this year when the season begins in Australia in two weeks.

His Ferrari teammate Lewis Hamilton did not take part in testing on Friday.

Russell believes his team needs to improve reliability.

“There definitely have been positives but for every time there is an issue it does definitely set you back quite a lot,” he said. “The car is feeling good, the new power units are feeling fast, and we’re making improvements every single day. However, we need to keep on improving the reliability.”

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AP Formula 1: https://apnews.com/hub/formula-one