Hamilton flies to pole in Singapore

Hamilton unbeatable in Singapore

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton, out to seal the deal on the title over Sebastian Vettel, put up a sensational lap of 1m36.015s in the Aldo Costa designed Mercedes to win pole for the Singapore GP.

Hamilton's lap was so fast the Ferraris were over 6/10ths slower and out to lunch. Max Verstappen was 2nd quick 3/10ths behind Hamilton with Vettel 0.613s behind the Mercedes ace.

Valtteri Bottas and Kimi Raikkonen rounded out the top-5.

Toto Wolff came on the radio afterwards and said, "Lewis, this is Toto, that was the most epic lap I've ever seen around here."

Hamilton called it 'magic'. Mercedes chief Toto Wolff 'stardust'. In what was surely one of the laps of Hamilton’s career, he went around the 5.063km track in 1m 36.015s, over three seconds up on Sebastian Vettel's pole time from 2017. Wolff added that it had been the most epic lap around Singapore that he could recall.

It’s tightly poised in the midfield, but after some initial struggles Force India won the battle with Sergio Perez taking P7 – his first ever top 10 grid slot in Singapore – ahead of the Haas of Romain Grosjean, the second Force India of Esteban Ocon and Nico Hulkenberg’s Renault.

This feels like a victory said Verstappen.

The Dutchman explains that with his issues, all things considered P2 is a pretty good effort – being adding that they need to "sort out" the engine for tomorrow.

Vettel sounded defeated, knowing Ferrari is so much slower than Hamilton's Mercedes.

"We had two laps and they were both not good enough"

Quotes

On the limit

Lewis Hamilton
That lap just started perfect and it just kept going – it felt magical. It felt like one of the best – if not the best lap I've ever done. It's what my brother and me would call a 'sexy lap'. I only had that one lap in me today, I just couldn't go any faster afterwards. This track is all about confidence, confidence in your braking points and the stability of the car, you only have a few laps to build your steps towards it. As soon as you lose it, it's very hard to build back up to it. So I'm grateful that I had the extra two laps on the HyperSofts in Q2 as I could try and understand the tyre a bit more. In Q3, it really felt like each corner was on the limit, but no more, I didn't have any wheel spin or any of that. I think the races have generally been quite strong for me this year, so I hope this will continue tomorrow. I'm going to work hard tonight to make sure the start is good. After that it will be all about looking after the tyres; making the HyperSofts last long won't be easy, but we're all in the same boat, so it should be interesting. The Ferraris and the Red Bulls in particular had good long-run pace, so we have a fight on our hands tomorrow. But I'm just so grateful that we did a better job today and so grateful for the support from everyone in the team today; this journey that I'm on with Mercedes and the entire team is just a remarkable experience.

[adinserter name="GOOGLE AD"]Valtteri Bottas
P4 is obviously not ideal, I can't be happy with today's result. Everything was going pretty well from FP3 all the way up to Q2, but then the others could find big chunks in Q3 and I couldn't, I just didn't really feel the track improvement. Lewis put in a great lap, but seven tenths is obviously a big gap, so I will need to have a look and analyse what exactly the issue was. The long-run times between Ferrari, Red Bull and us looked fairly comparable, so it's a shame I couldn't qualify higher and attack from the front row. We are definitely more competitive here than we were last year. The car has been improved and we also chose the right set-up direction. So I'm optimistic for tomorrow; it's a new day and at least one Ferrari will start behind me. We still have a long race ahead of us and I will push hard to try and get ahead of Sebastian. With three teams in the mix, everything is possible. It's difficult to overtake on this track, so both the start and the strategy will decide who wins this race.

Toto Wolff
That was an incredible, horrible session! Just a rollercoaster of emotions from start to finish. We nearly dropped out in Q1 after sticking to the UltraSoft tyre, which was a nerve-wracking wait to make sure we didn't shoot ourselves in the foot at the first opportunity. Then Lewis produced one of the most incredible qualifying laps I have witnessed to take pole position. I just have to say a big thank you to all the team back at base in Brackley and Brixworth, who have worked so hard to understand our problems at this circuit and to improve on our weaknesses. It's incredibly encouraging to see the step forward in understanding we have made, with Valtteri splitting the Ferraris and Lewis right at the sharp end of the grid by a healthy margin. Now we need to put aside the happiness from today because we haven't scored any points yet this weekend. The real job comes on Sunday and, like we have seen in recent races, the balance can swing very quickly. We will keep our heads down, focus on the job and make sure we deliver tomorrow.

James Allison
It is difficult to put into words how it feels on days like this. It is overwhelming on so many levels, first and foremost to have the privilege of being here to watch a lap of such rare quality by a driver at the peak of his powers, on a circuit that punishes even the slightest error. It was a breath-taking performance by Lewis. Until Q3, it had been a fractious qualifying session: we got through Q1 by the skin of our teeth after being overly brave running the UltraSoft tyre, and spent most of Q2 trying to get our pulses back until control before the final push. On a more profound level, this circuit has been a monkey on our team's back for several years, and it is hard for anyone who does not work in the sport to understand just how much thought, analysis and effort have gone into understanding why we have been weak here. So that makes it all the more special to have a day like today, when Lewis puts us decisively on pole position with the car handling sweetly. But that sense of satisfaction lasts only for a moment, now our attention turns to what really counts – tomorrow's race.

MAX VERSTAPPEN
“Today was the best Qualifying session I’ve had in Formula 1. Given the engine driveability issues we faced in Practice and Qualifying I was very surprised to bring it home in P2. My Q3 lap was really good and we made progress with the set-up in every session which meant the car felt great at the end. The main step was finding quite a bit of front grip, this helped a lot come Q2 and Q3. Around here if you feel it was a good lap with few mistakes it usually translates into a front row. Even with the odd false neutral we managed to be on the front row so I’m really happy. If I can take a metre against Lewis at the start, and get in the lead, there is a good chance of a win as it’s a hard track to pass on. You still need luck with Safety Cars but as always I will do my best. I can certainly say I have put myself in a good position to try."

DANIEL RICCIARDO
“It was a strange session and I was surprised that we lost so much pace in Q3. We made some changes between FP3 and Qualifying and initially the car felt pretty sweet. Everything we changed seemed positive and I thought we would get quicker and quicker as the track evolved, but we just lost pace as the session went on. I don’t have any answers as to why that happened yet which is pretty frustrating. I honestly thought we had a really good chance of a front row and in the space of an hour we lost a second to our competitors. Even with two attempts in Q3 we just couldn’t improve. It felt like we did everything right but the lap time doesn’t show it. I know we have good race pace but on a street circuit Qualifying is so important. It was strange and frustrating but hopefully we will find some answers."

CHRISTIAN HORNER, Team Principal
After looking at the times in FP2 and FP3, for Max to finish on the front row in Qualifying today is a massive achievement. He struggled with driveability issues during all three sessions which the Renault technicians tried hard to resolve. Max was able to drive around the issues in Qualifying and to end up on the front row is a fantastic effort. Daniel looked competitive in Q1 and Q2 but unfortunately the balance seemed to move away from him during the first Q3 run and although they reverted to the initial setting for the final run, sixth was the outcome. We all know he loves street circuits so I’m sure he will be fighting hard to make up ground tomorrow with what we believe is a good race car. The start will be important and we know the Hypersoft has high degradation, so it will be fascinating to see the different strategies that everyone employs in the race."

Qualifying Results

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