Lewis Hamilton is no stranger to making history in Formula One, but on Saturday evening, he looked far from his record-breaking form in qualifying at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.
The Mercedes driver struggled to find pace in the car throughout the early stages of the evening in Jeddah. He ended up 16th after the first round of qualifying, a mere 0.087 seconds off of Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll, who finished in 15th place.
Hamilton hovered around the elimination zone before moving into 15th just before time expired in the first round. However, Stroll posted a personal best in Q1 for the day just after Hamilton had crossed the line to claim the last spot in the Q2 field.
It’s the first time that Hamilton has failed to make the second round of qualifying since the Brazil Grand Prix in 2017. Excluding poor weather, crashes or mechanical issues, Saturday’s session marked the first time that the seven-time world champion was knocked out of Q1 due to poor performance since ’09, according to journalist Phillip Horton.
It’s been a difficult 24 hours in the world of Formula One after the sport’s drivers held a lengthy meeting on Friday night after many of them expressed major concerns about moving ahead with the race because of concerns about their safety. The event will go on as planned Sunday after Houthis rebels in Yemen attacking an Aramco oil depot in the city, several miles away from the Jeddah street circuit on Friday morning.
Hamilton, who said earlier this week that he was “uncomfortable” with racing in Saudi Arabia due the country’s civil rights violations, claimed in interview after his elimination that the events of the week did not have an affect on his on-track performance.
“Just struggled with the balance of the car… not really where I want to be,” he explained, per Sky Sports.
Hamilton finished on the podium last weekend at the Bahrain Grand Prix, nabbing third after both Red Bull cars fell out of the race in the final few laps. However, he expressed worries before the start of the season about Mercedes’ performance in pre-season testing, saying that he was doubtful that he would be in the running for wins early on in the year.
“It feels a lot different,” Hamilton said. “It’s not as good, I don’t think it’s going to look as it did last year with the difficult session we had in testing and then switch over into the race.
“I think we have far bigger challenges this time and there not one-week turnarounds, they’ll take a little bit longer. But from what I told, we have a considerable amount of pace to find.”
