The championship leading team showed increased pace once again in readiness for the second to last round of the 2015 FIA World Endurance Championship tomorrow. 

Under bright skies and warmer temperatures than yesterday, the No.17  Porsche 919 Hybrid, in the hands of Brendon Hartley, lapped in 1m42.799s. The conditions were much quicker than yesterday with the New Zealander's time some 2.4 seconds faster than the best time from FP2.

Hartley’s best run was a full second ahead of the sister No.18 Porsche 919 Hybrid, which was driven by Marc Lieb this morning. 

Audi Sport Team Joest saw its two Audi R18 e-tron quattros place third and fourth with the No.7 outpacing the No.8 car. Benoit Treluyer set a 1m44.956s best, while Loic Duval was just under 0.7s away from the No.7 car, with a 1m45.645s lap time. 

Toyota Racing again placed fifth and sixth but got much closer to the ultimate pace in FP3 with the No.1 Toyota TS 0104 HYBRID 0.7s away from the No.8 Audi. Sebastien Buemi and Alex Wurz registered the respective lap times for the reigning champion team this morning.

Rebellion Racing was again leading the LMP1 Privateer category, as Dominic Kraihamer set a 1m49.321s lap in the No.13 car. It was a mixed session for the Anglo/Swiss team however, as the No.12 R-One-AER only completed five laps after a technical problem confined it to the pits for the majority of the hour.

In LMP2, it was very much a mixed session for the G-Drive Racing team this morning. The No.28 Ligier-Nissan driven by Gustavo Yacaman set an early pace that was never bettered, while in second place was the Strakka Racing Gibson in the hands of Danny Watts.

LMP2 points leader, the No.26 G-Drive Racing entry, suffered an accident twenty minutes into the session when Julien Canal lost control of the Ligier-Nissan at the exit of the quick turn 13, coming onto the back straight. Canal hit the wall but emerged unhurt, however there was plenty for the G-Drive squad to fix before the qualifying session this afternoon.

AF Corse continued to show good form in the LMGTE Pro class with Gianmaria Bruni claiming the best time in the Ferrari 458 Italia he shares with Toni Vilander. The multiple FIA WEC champion peaked on a fastest lap of 2m02.747 which was 0.4 faster than the quickest Friday time.

The No.92 Porsche 911 RSR placed second with Frederic Makowiecki setting an early session best of 2m03.168. The car, however, suffered a small amount of damage toward the end of the hour when it was hit by the ByKolles CLM P1/01 driven by Pierre Kaffer.

The LMGTE Am category saw another close fight with only 0.2s separating the SMP Racing Ferrari and the Dempsey-Proton Porsche. Aleksey Basov registered the best lap for the Russian Ferrari with a 2m04.688s, while Pat Long claimed a quickest tour of 2m04.899s.

Making it three manufacturers in the top three was the Aston Martin Racing entry with Pedro Lamy stopping the clocks on 2m05.355s in the Vantage V8.

The qualifying sessions are scheduled to begin at the Shanghai International Circuit at 13.30 local time.