Before Saturday, Lewis Hamilton had always qualified inside the top five for a United States Grand Prix in Austin, but this time he could only achieve the 19th fastest time in a Q1 session that he would prefer to forget.
Lewis Hamilton is requesting for his team to have him begin the United States Grand Prix from the pit lane following his exceptional qualifying disaster.
The seven-time Formula 1 champion recorded a time that placed him 19th in Q1 on Saturday, representing his poorest performance at the Circuit of the Americas to date. Following this, he acknowledged that modifications had been implemented on his car between the earlier Sprint race and the qualifying session.
He stated, “During the Sprint, we experienced a type of failure on the formation lap concerning the front suspension, which persisted throughout the Sprint race. This significantly affected the balance of the car.”
We made some adjustments to align more with our previous plan, but the car had issues during today’s qualifying session. It is best to begin at the pit lane, or else I won’t make any progress. It was simply an unstable equilibrium without any traction.
A Mercedes representative verified that a bearing issue was found on Hamilton’s vehicle and repaired during the breaks. There was no initial indication that the problem had resurfaced, however the Brit was clearly dissatisfied with the way his car performed on the track.
Hamilton will begin the race in 18th place, moving up one spot from his qualifying position due to a grid penalty for Liam Lawson. However, the seven-time F1 champion has expressed his desire to start from the pit lane, subtly urging his team to violate parc ferme regulations and adjust his car’s setup for better performance.
Leave a Reply