Lewis Hamilton revealed his DRS would not open in the final part of qualifying, hampering his chances of being in the battle for pole in Hungary on Saturday.
Hamilton’s Mercedes team-mate George Russell took his first career pole position in stunning fashion on Saturday afternoon, in a session which had seen the Ferrari pair of Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc look favourites for pole.
But despite not setting a purple sector at any point, Russell earned pole in his Mercedes, while Hamilton was clearly disappointed to have not been in the fight at the front at that point, with a faulty rear wing being the culprit.
“Yeah, I tried to open the DRS and it wouldn’t open, so a bit unfortunate,” Hamilton said to Sky Sports F1 after the session.
He added that he felt capable of being in the battle in the final part of qualifying, and he hoped to have a chance of locking out the first two grid slots at least.
He offered his congratulations to Russell though, and said his result is a just reward for the work Mercedes have done to try and get back to the front.
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“I was feeling great. Yeah, I was for sure,” Hamilton said. “Front row was definitely there, so [it] would have been awesome to have got a front row for the team, but these things happen.
“Congratulations to George, he did an amazing job and it’s a great result for the team given all that we’ve gone through.
“That’s huge. So, really happy for everyone. We definitely didn’t expect that.”
Both Red Bull drivers will start P10 and P11 respectively, after Max Verstappen suffered a loss of power that stopped him fighting in Q3, while Sergio Perez was knocked out in Q2.
Hamilton saw a lot of the back of Fernando Alonso’s Alpine at last year’s Hungarian Grand Prix, and he will have to overtake him at the start to avoid a similar fate, with the Spaniard starting one place ahead of the Mercedes driver.
Lando Norris and Esteban Ocon rounded out the top five in qualifying, meanwhile, with what should be an exciting race to look forward to on Sunday.
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