Mercedes deludes itself but then fails. Hamilton: “I’m not satisfied”

Ups and downs

The free practice session in the morning had led us to imagine a Mercedes potentially able to fight for the front row in the Sprint qualifying of the Austrian GP. The reality of the facts, however, was different: Russell finished SQ3 with the fourth fastest timeguaranteeing himself the second row behind Verstappen and the two McLarens. Hamilton fared even less well, slipping to P6 behind also the Ferrari of Carlos Sainz. Two results judged inevitably disappointing by both drivers of the silver arrows.

Hamilton disappointed

“Today I had a difficult Sprint Qualifying – admitted Hamilton, who in FP1 had been impressive (in a positive sense) in the race simulation with the hard tyres – Testing went well and the car felt good. I don’t think we had the pace to fight for Sprint pole position, but we probably had more speed than we showed. I was not satisfied with any of my laps and Sprint qualifying was a pretty messy session overall“.

“Tomorrow’s Sprint race will be challenging – he then recognized the seven-time world champion – it’s not easy to overtake in these parts and starting from P6 makes things difficult for us. If it isn’t an eventful race, I don’t think we can advance many positions. However, we will still give our best. Our main objective, however, is obviously to focus on qualifying in the late afternoon and the race on Sunday“.

Russell looks forward

More optimistic Russell, who dreams of a top-3 placement at the end of the Sprint. However, today’s qualifying wasn’t perfect for him either: “I was a bit surprised by the gap from P1 – declared the former Williams – but I probably pushed too much on the launch lap. That potentially took a bit of grip off the tyre. From inside the car, it felt like the best lap of the session, so that’s probably why we dropped back a bit.”.