George Russell flew the flag for Mercedes and Britain by securing the third grid slot for the Las Vegas Grand Prix, while Lewis Hamilton endured another poor qualifying session
Lewis Hamilton and Toto Wolff wish Mercedes had the one-lap pace Ferrari were once again able to show at the Las Vegas Grand Prix.
The seven-time world champion didn’t even make it through to Q3, narrowly missing out on the top 10. Meanwhile, Ferrari flexed their qualifying muscles again as both drivers beat Max Verstappen, who only managed to go third quickest.
Carlos Sainz was second on the timesheets but will drop 10 places thanks to a grid penalty. It means Hamilton will actually start the race 10th, which still leaves him with plenty of ground to make up.
Hamilton has already made it clear he is counting down the days until this season is over. And he very much gave that impression again, sounding uninterested as he reacted to qualifying.
It’s not very good. We were looking fairly competitive yesterday and we were feeling a little bit better,” he said. “Overnight, some changes were made. I was kind of put on the back foot after FP3, which was pretty bad. I was basically trying to recover in qualifying, which is never the right place to do that.
“I was having trouble gripping the car; it wasn’t working for me.” Furthermore, it’s challenging when you can’t even finish Q2. When asked what he thinks he can accomplish in the race, he made it clear he has no expectations, saying, “Your guess is as good as mine.”
One, we experienced severe graining like everyone else, and it also had to do with the tyres. We experienced some rear graining in FP3, so I believe that tomorrow’s success will mostly depend on how you handle it, how far you go, and where you push and where you don’t. However, I must admit that watching the Ferrari today is impressive. What a fast car!”
Mercedes’s qualifying performance wasn’t entirely awful. In spite of Hamilton’s difficulties, George Russell performed a far better job of transferring heat into his tires and was rewarded by making it to qualifying round three and finishing quickly enough to take the third position on the grid.
When asked what made his drivers different, team manager Wolff replied, “It’s still a mystery.” You are able to observe the difference when the tires are in the correct window. It was evident in free practice three already. extremely challenging to comprehend.
We’re really talking about a temperature differential of four or five degrees between grip and no grip. It’s evident that certain teams, like the McLarens, are at the forefront and finish first in qualifying. Meanwhile, the Ferraris are putting in incredible laps, with both of them finishing half a second faster than the rest of the field.”
Leave a Reply