Showing no sign of slowing down (literally), Lewis Hamilton makes history … again.
MONTMELO, Spain—Lewis Hamilton kept his cool Saturday afternoon, avoiding Sergio Perez’s last-minute spin, to take his 100-career pole for Sunday’s Spanish Grand Prix. It is the first time that a Formula 1 driver has achieved the century mark.
Lewis Hamilton: I can’t believe that we are at 100. It has been a dream to work with these guys (his team). I feel very humble and grateful.”
Ferrari’s Max Verstappen was a close second, while Valtteri Bottas took third in the second Mercedes. “I think second for us was very good today,” Verstappen said after qualifying. “And being this close is something I can be happy about.”
It was a good outcome for Bottas, too. But as usual, he finished behind teammate Hamilton. “Yes, that was close,'” he said, “definitely a battle for the pole.”
One of the most interesting features of the day was a 10-minute delay of the start of qualifying, a pause that resulted from an incident in an earlier support race when a car crash into turn 10. When qualifying finally got underway, Lando Norris got things going in the opening session, while Verstappen took second. Yuki Tsunoda was the big surprise in his Alpha Tauri, getting knocked out early. Many others, including Kimi Raikkonen, the two Haas teammates, Mick Schumacher, and Nikita Mazepin, and Nicholas Latifi, suffered the same fate.
On the day, Charles Leclerc led the best of the rest with fourth in his Ferrari, followed by a stunning performance by Alpine’s Esteban Ocon who took fifth.
Carlos Sainz Jr. was sixth in the second Ferrari, with Daniel Ricciardo seventh in the other McLaren. Perez was eighth, Norris ninth, and Fernando Alonso rounded out the final session by taking tenth in his Alpine.
Despite winning last week in Portugal, Hamilton only holds an eight-point lead in the world championships ahead of Verstappen. So, on Sunday, might we see another classic battle between Mercedes and Red Bull? Well, at this venue, Red Bull hasn’t won since 2016, and the Silver Arrows have been victorious every year since.
We’ll see if that storyline changes.
