George Russell and Lewis Hamilton will launch their Saudi Arabian GP on Saturday from the fourth row of the grid after a frustrating qualifying session that the pair respectively seventh and eighth.
Overnight changes significantly improved the balance of Mercedes’ W15 in FP3, but qualifying proved more challenging, with strong single-lap pace difficult to find, especially in Jeddah’s first sector.
Both drivers made the Q3 cut – although Hamilton came perilously close to being knocked out.
However, a mistake by Russell thwarted his final run on the soft tyre while Hamilton was able to improve on his second flyer, but only marginally.
“That was a very annoying qualifying session!” commented Mercedes boss Toto Wolff. “We've got a quick car, but it is on a knife's edge.
“The drivers are struggling to squeeze out the lap consistently. George was on his way to a strong lap and could have been fighting for spots on the second row. Unfortunately he lost the rear of the car.
“Lewis meanwhile never had the feedback from the car that he wanted, and that meant he couldn't go faster.”
Russell owned up to his error in the top-ten shootout which he concluded 0.844s off the pace of Red Bull poleman Max Verstappen.
“Unfortunately I was unable to complete my last lap on the new tyres,” he said. “I made a mistake, which is on me, and that was that. My quickest lap therefore was on the used tyres.
“It was a strong one but if I had finished my final effort, I think we may have been fighting for P4 or even higher.
“It is so tight out there and we saw last week that if you don't get everything together, then you can lose several positions.
“We are still learning about this car; we were P1 and P2 in practice in Bahrain and P2 here again yesterday. We slipped back today but there is potential there. It's a long season so we will be looking to understand more about the platform we have and deliver more consistently.”
While frustrated, Russell was nevertheless confident that Mercedes has a good race car on its hand for Saturday.
“We look quick in a straight-line, which is a bonus. It's tricky to follow here though and it should be a simple one-stop with the degradation. We need to make a good start and see what we can do from there.”
Hamilton was initially hopeful of a good result in the Friday evening session, given the positive changes he experienced in FP3.
“It was a very difficult day today,” he said. “I was much happier in FP3, and the car was feeling much better than on Thursday. It was a real improvement, and I had a lot more confidence in the car.
“Unfortunately, in qualifying, it felt similar to yesterday and I didn't have the stability from the car that I needed. It was a struggle, and we were losing out particularly in the high-speed first sector.
©Mercedes
“Our race pace is typically better than our qualifying pace. We have also been quick in a straight-line so hopefully that helps us. It will be difficult, but we will be giving it everything we've got to progress forward tomorrow. If we can do so, that would be great. “
“I think the race pace will be very close between ourselves, the Ferraris, and the McLarens,” concluded Wolff. “Our target is to try to be ahead of them tomorrow, but we know overtaking isn't easy here.
“Last week, we thought we had a car that was quicker in race trim, but we were unable to show that. Hopefully we will have a better evening here in Jeddah. We will do our best and see what we can deliver.”
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