FORMULA 1
LCH TEASES BOTTAS TO THE VERY END AND DENIES HIM POLE
LCH denies pole position from Bottas with a final lap in an exciting Portuguese GP qualifying session that went to the wire on F1’s debut at Portimao.
A 92nd F1 victory for Hamilton on Sunday would see him take the record for the most grands prix wins outright, two weeks after equaling Michael Schumacher’s long-standing milestone.
Marshals supervising repairs to the drain covers at Portimao Portugal.
LCH dropped to third behind Bottas and Red Bull’s Max Verstappen mid-way through his final lap of Q3 but was going quicker than both of them behind on the track and hit the front with a time of 1:16.652, one tenth clear of the sister Mercedes.
One broken heart for Valtteri Bottas,” said Sky F1’s Martin Brundle after the Finn had topped all three practice sessions, Q2 and the first runs of the pole shootout.
“Every lap he’s been supreme, but when it matters most Lewis Hamilton has knitted it all together beautifully.”
Out of keeping with the usual thinking in Q3, Mercedes switched their cars to the supposedly ‘slower’ medium tyres for the final laps of the session – and the move paid handsome dividends.
The world champions had held an advantage of just a tenth of a second over Verstappen when they all ran on the theoretically faster soft tyres in the first Q3 laps, but their advantage grew on the mediums to secure yet another front-row lockout ahead of Verstappen in his perennial third place in 2020.