Mercedes Formula 1 driver Lewis Hamilton took his third pole position of the season at Barcelona ahead of his championship leader Sebastian Vettel.
Hamilton topped all three sessions and beat Vettel, who recovered well from mechanical issues in both FP3 and Q1. Hamilton took pole with a 1m19.149s, just 0.051seconds ahead of the German.
The second row will be occupied by Valtteri Bottas and Kimi Raikkonen. Despite running with an older engine than his team-mate, Bottas still managed to qualify just over two tenths behind Hamilton.
Red Bull once again occupy the third row with 2016 winner Max Verstappen ahead of his Australian team-mate Daniel Ricciardo.
Arguably the star of qualifying was Fernando Alonso who hauled his McLaren into Q3 for the first time this season and then went on to set the seventh fastest time.
Williams’ Felipe Massa split the Force India duo in eighth place, with Esteban Ocon getting into the final part of qualifying for the second consecutive race.
Kevin Magnussen was 11th quickest ahead of Spaniard Carlos Sainz Jr. who failed to replicate his strong pace show in practice. Renault’s Nico Hulkenberg also failed to impress and qualified a lowly 13th.
Romain Grosjean struggled at the final chicane all qualifying long, and an off in Q2 at Turn 14 grounded him to 14th place on the grid.
Pascal Wehrlein beat his Sauber team-mate Marcus Ericsson into Q2 by just 0.005s. Jolyon Palmer who qualified 17th admitted the “pace has gone.”
Lance Stroll and Stoffel Vandoorne were once again eliminated in Q1 in 18th and 19th respectively.
Vandoorne remains the only driver on the grid to have failed to get out of the first part of qualifying this season.
Daniil Kvyat’s miserable weekend continued with the slowest time in the first part of qualifying meaning he will start the race from 20th.
Comments.
Loading comments…