Lewis Hamilton has secured pole position for the Spanish Grand Prix after edging out Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg during the final stage of qualifying at the Circuit de Catalunya-Barcelona today, marking his first pole at the race.
The British driver posted a fastest lap time of 1:25.232 to finish one-tenth clear of Rosberg, as the Silver Arrows locked out the front row of the grid for the fourth time this season.
Daniel Ricciardo finished as best of the rest in third place, albeit some nine-tenths behind the Mercedes drivers. Valtteri Bottas produced a stunning final lap to qualify in fourth place for Williams, whilst Romain Grosjean ended up in fifth place ahead of both Ferraris.
It was another difficult day for Sebastian Vettel as the German driver suffered a gearbox problem during Q3, leaving him down in 10th place.
Since the end of final practice, the track temperature had rocketed, meaning that it was immediately quicker than it had been at the end of the morning session. A number of drivers came out early in order to post a time, but the session came to an abrupt halt just 90 seconds after the green light when Pastor Maldonado crashed his Lotus at turn three. Although he walked away unharmed, a red flag was required to recover the stricken Lotus.
The restart saw most of the drivers head out, including the two Mercedes drivers who would ultimately battle for pole. Nico Rosberg immediately went fastest of all, but Hamilton’s first lap was slow after he ran onto the grass. He soon made up for it, though, by moving up into second place behind his teammate, and Sebastian Vettel slotted into third place, albeit some seven-tenths down on the Mercedes’ drivers. Daniil Kvyat put in a good lap to finish in sixth place, but Romain Grosjean was having a bit of trouble with his front tires in the sole remaining Lotus, but eventually got through.
With five minutes to go, a number of drivers switched to the quicker option tire to secure a place in Q2. Sergio Perez and Kevin Magnussen both improved to give themselves a bit more security, and Adrian Sutil moved up to P16 with his last lap, putting Jenson Button at risk. The 2009 world champion duly redressed the balance and moved up to P9, thus dumping Sutil out of qualifying along with the two Marussias, the two Caterhams and Maldonado in the Lotus.
Only Force India and Williams ventured out on track at the beginning of Q2, but this gave Nico Hulkenberg and Sergio Perez a chance to go P1 and P2 early on. With around 10 minutes to go, the rest of the runners emerged from the pits to get in a first lap time, and Mercedes soon resumed normal service by going P1 and P2 with Rosberg ahead of Hamilton. Red Bull slotted in behind the Silver Arrows, whilst Romain Grosjean managed to move up to sixth with his first lap of the session ahead of Fernando Alonso.
Kevin Magnussen’s qualifying came to an early end as a technical problem forced him to get out of his car without posting a time. Jean-Eric Vergne was also sidelined, meaning that with his grid penalty he will start last tomorrow. Mercedes and Red Bull could afford not to run again, such was their advantage, but the other 10 cars on track needed to head out and post a quicker time.
Jenson Button managed to improve and squeeze into the final shoot-out, but the Force India pair were less fortunate as they qualified 11th and 12th with Hulkenberg ahead of Perez. Daniil Kvyat could not repeat his Q1 escapades and finished 13th, whilst Esteban Gutierrez finished as the top Sauber in P14.
Mercedes was the first team to come out in Q3 as both of its drivers planned for two runs in the battle for pole position. However, the session was soon stopped when Sebastian Vettel’s car lost drive, forcing the German to pull his car up at the side of the road and bringing out the red flags.
Once the session restarted, there was a rush to get back out on track and make up for the time lost under the red flag. Rosberg was the first to lay down a benchmark, but he was beaten into second place by Hamilton who went some two-tenths quicker. Daniel Ricciardo slotted into third place ahead of Fernando Alonso, but the rest of the drivers opted to wait for one run at the end of the session.
The final runs saw all of the drivers improve their times on fresh tires, and although Rosberg managed to go quicker, Hamilton went faster still to secure his fourth pole position of the season. Ricciardo slotted into third place as best of the rest ahead of surprise front-runners Valtteri Bottas and Romain Grosjean. Kimi Raikkonen ran well to outqualify his Ferrari teammate Fernando ALonso, whilst Jenson Button and Felipe Massa finished in eighth and ninth ahead of Vettel in P10.
He’s the man in form after three straight wins, and it is hard to bet against Lewis Hamilton making it four in a row on Sunday. Once again, Rosberg simply had no answer to his teammate.
Can Lewis take the lead of the championship? Tune in from 7:30am ET on NBCSN and Live Extra tomorrow to find out.
