Lewis Hamilton and his new team-mate George Russell had to settle for fifth and ninth in Saturday’s qualifying as they were unable to keep up a lap behind the speedy Ferrari and Red Bull under the floodlights on the track. Sakhir.
However, following the departure of a late safety car due to a fire in Pierre Gasly’s car, Red Bull suffered a dramatic double retirement from Max Verstappen and Sergio Pérez with just a few laps to go, leaving third place in the hands of Hamilton , with Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz at the top of the podium.
With Russell in fourth position, Mercedes minimized damage, although it has yet to recover from its W13 design problems. The seven-time champion, with a smile on his face at once again being able to climb onto the podium, said he was grateful for his surprising performance after enduring a “difficult” race struggling with his car.
“First of all a big, big congratulations to Ferrari, I’m happy to see them do well again, it’s such a historic and epic team,” said the Englishman. “It’s great to see Carlos [Sainz] and Charles [Leclerc] up there too, so congratulations to them.”
“It was a very difficult race, we had problems during practice, and this is the best result we could get. Of course it was unlucky for the other drivers, but we did the best we could and I am grateful for those points.” he stated while referring to the abandonment of the Red Bulls.
Asked if Mercedes plans to introduce updates that would allow the German team to compete against Ferrari and the energy drink team, Hamilton acknowledged “there will be no quick turnaround” to take advantage of Brackley’s car.
“I’m hopeful, I know they’re working very hard at the factory and it’s not going to be a quick turnaround,” he continued. “I feel like we’ve been the best team for a long time, I know we all know that, just keep your head down and keep working, there’s a long way to go.”
