Saturday, October 9th, 2021
Vettel implements speed limit idea
Hamilton with a statement after a penalty transfer
Lewis Hamilton makes a statement in Istanbul. He wins qualifying and starts eleventh. Valtteri Bottas inherits the pole. Max Verstappen is not enough for Mercedes. Mick Schumacher celebrates Q2. The Haas driver starts from P14, Vettel fails early.
Lewis Hamilton received the miniature tire as an award for the fastest in qualifying, but feelings of happiness were not appropriate on Saturday. Because of his engine penalty, the world championship leader will only go into the Turkish Grand Prix from eleven on the grid. After all, Hamilton operated maximum damage limitation, and his teammate also fulfilled part one of the mission: Valtteri Bottas inherited starting position one and now has to keep Hamilton’s title rival Max Verstappen in check directly behind.
“Tomorrow it will be difficult, I’ll give it my all,” said Hamilton, who is also not credited with the pole in the statistics – he is still “only” at 101: “But we saw what can happen in the last race as Max plowed through the field. There’s a long straight here, maybe something is possible there. ”
Two points up, nine places down
Nine places separate the 36-year-old from Red Bull star Verstappen (24), who is only two points behind him in the drivers’ standings. So actually everyone expects the Red Bull driver to take back the championship lead. But the bull racing team looked at the pace of Mercedes and above all Hamilton on Saturday with a slightly anxious look. “I hope Lewis won’t be near us too soon,” said Red Bull motorsport advisor Helmut Marko.
The four-time champion Sebastian Vettel (Heppenheim / Aston Martin) starts the race from tenth on the grid thanks to Hamilton’s penalty. Haas driver Mick Schumacher secured 14th place and thus achieved his best qualifying result to date.
“I’m very happy,” said the 22-year-old at Sky: “I enjoyed it a lot and was just happy to drive in Q2. It was strange, but I like to make it a habit.”
Vettel frustration
On the other hand, Vettel was quite frustrated: “I struggled a little. Especially where it was still a bit wet. There is no real performance curve, we are just as fast or slow as before the summer break.”
Hamilton uses its fourth combustion engine of the season in Turkey – only three can be used without penalty. Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff gave his opinion on the prospects of his top driver for the 16th race of the season on Sunday (2 p.m. / Sky and in the live ticker on ntv.de) pessimistic: “Overtaking is difficult here, almost nothing works.”
It had started to rain over the Istanbul Park Circuit on Friday evening, the precipitation only stopped during the final training session in the late morning, but it kept trickling in qualifying as well. The meteorologists expect a dry track for the race. However, there is still a residual risk. A glimmer of hope for Hamilton: In all conditions, he made a very strong one