Lewis Hamilton has blamed another miserable qualifying performance on Mercedes’ tyres.
The Mercedes star is set to start Sunday’s Azerbaijan GP at P7 after another tricky Saturday outing. It followed a promising practice from the British driver in Baku.
But that was of no consolation to Hamilton, who has been left frustrated at a familiar trend starting to develop. Speaking after Saturday’s qualifying result, he said:
“Same Saturday as always – the same thing as every Saturday.
“Yesterday, the car was amazing, it felt great and I honestly think it could have been at least on the second row today. But we came today and all of a sudden the tyres didn’t work well today.”
Hamilton’s frustration in Baku is not the first time that he has hit out at his performance in qualifying. He was also far from pleased a fortnight ago in Monza.
He let his anger be known straight after qualifying. Hamilton said:
“I’m furious, absolutely furious, because I could have been on pole. I think I could have been at least on the front row, but I just didn’t do the job at the end. I lost a tenth and a half in turns one and two and another tenth at the end, so there’s no-one to blame but myself.
“Qualifying has been my weakness for a minute now and I can’t figure it out. But I’ll keep trying. I’ll be kicking myself for the next couple of hours.”
Toto Wolff had some consoling words for his star despite Hamilton’s fury.
He added: “Half a tenth normally makes the difference between three places. On Lewis’ side, it’s just tiny mistakes, tiny things that make all the difference between second or even pole, or fifth.”
In the end, Hamilton did manage to recover after his poor qualifying display. He finished fifth in Monza, claiming ten championship points. It leaves Hamilton sitting sixth in the drivers standings in what is his last season with Mercedes ahead of a blockbuster move to Ferrari.
While Hamilton faced more frustration in Baku, teammate George Russell was far more diplomatic. Speaking after qualification, he said:
“I think it was a fair result. To be honest, yesterday was a scrappy day – I was not very pleased with my driving and I was a long way behind Lewis.
“Today, I felt much more comfortable, very close to P3. Ferrari always seem to be so quick on these types of tracks. For five or six years now in Baku, Monaco, Singapore, they always seem exceptionally fast, Charles especially.
“He’s exceptional on these types of tracks, but they’ve definitely been strong as a team and we need to try and understand what that is on these circuits because they’re always a step ahead.”
