Lewis Hamilton kept Mercedes on top in the final practice session at the Italian Grand Prix as Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel managed to split the two Mercedes at the top of the timesheets.
Hamilton's time of 1:24.544 was 0.264s clear of Vettel and 0.299s quicker than Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg. The track was damp at the start of the session and there were still wet patches off the racing line by the end of the hour, which may have contributed to Hamilton failing to match his blistering pace from Friday practice. Vettel, however, was able to improve on his FP2 time.
Ferrari's performance may have been spurred on by the arrival of chairman Sergio Marchionne in the paddock on Saturday morning, continuing the tradition set by his predecessor Luca di Montezemolo of joining the team at its home race. It is not known whether Vettel ran a little lighter on fuel to impress his boss, but the result certainly gave the Tifosi in the grandstands something to cheer about.
Williams also upped its pace on Saturday morning, with Valtteri Bottas fourth fastest and Felipe Massa fifth. Nico Hulkenberg was the only driver with a Mercedes engine behind him not to make the top ten, as Force India appeared to lose some of the edge it held over its midfield rivals on Friday. That allowed Pastor Maldonado to finish the session sixth ahead of Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari in seventh and Sergio Perez in the other Force India eighth.
McLaren had a more promising session, although that may have been a result of the Red Bulls and Toro Rossos struggling as much as a genuine improvement. Jenson Button and Fernando Alonso are likely to start near the back of the grid regardless once their engine change penalties have been applied, but will most likely still be ahead of Daniel Ricciardo, whose brand new engine expired with a "terminal" failure during the session.