Lewis Hamilton made an extraordinary claim after Saturday’s qualifying for the Formula Monaco Grand Prix, saying he expects to lose out to Mercedes team-mate George Russell in every qualifying session this year.
After topping opening practice and finishing second and third in FP2 and FP3 respectively, Hamilton wound up seventh in Saturday’s qualifying.
Meanwhile, Russell was fourth and Hamilton was left dumbfounded after the session.
“I already know automatically that I’m going to lose two-tenths going into qualifying,” Hamilton told Sky Sports F1.
“I don’t anticipate being ahead of George in qualifying, particularly this year.”
When asked by Sky why he figured he’d be behind Russell all year, Hamilton simply quipped, “We’ll see.”
Russell qualified fifth, 0.273s off of Charles Leclerc’s pole effort, moving him seven-one ahead of Hamilton on qualifying for the year.
The seven-time champion found himself three and a half tenths back from Leclerc’s time and he wasn’t pleased, to say the least.
After expressing that the Mercedes W15 was feeling the best it had all year on Friday, Hamilton feels his fortunes always change in qualifying.
“So, yesterday was really strong,” Hamilton said.
“As soon as we started qualifying, it’s like, I don’t know if it’s a turndown of performance, but the performance comes away from my car for some reason, so it’s frustrating we’re seventh.
“I was driving the same through yesterday and today, and the car was performing pretty well, yeah… small difference between the two cars, George has the upgraded front wing, so that created performance differences, particularly in the high speed, but otherwise for some reason once we got to qualifying I had no more.”
With overtaking at a premium around Monaco, Hamilton will be resigned to circling the lower end of the points on Sunday afternoon, pondering what might have been had his practice pace not deserted him throughout qualifying.
Monaco’s qualifying offered a glimmer of hope in what has so far been a bleak final season with the Mercedes outfit.
Still, respite is offered to Hamilton in the form of the scarlet red car he’ll be sat in next season, which just so happens to be lining up at the front of Rows 1 and 2 for Sunday’s GP.
For the Briton’s sake, by the time the 2025 season comes around, the F1 record pole-winner will need to have rediscovered his once devastating Saturday form as he will be going up against Leclerc, who is on 24 poles and counting.
