Hamilton And Russell Bemused by “Difficult” 2022 US GP Qualifying

Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton and George Russell were both bemused by “difficult” Qualifying session for 2022 US Grand Prix.

Having looked competitive in FP3 in a session where he briefly went fastest, Hamilton struggled to match Ferrari and Red Bull in Qualifying as he qualified fifth, but penalties for Charles Leclerc and Sergio Perez promoted Hamilton and Russell to the second row.

Reflecting on his “very difficult” Qualifying session, Hamilton admitted that his Mercedes proved “such a handful” as he indicated that a drop in temperature plus increase in wind could of been to blame for his loss of pace from FP3.

The seven-time champion added that he had entered this round with confidence as he explained: “I felt so optimistic all weekend: the car had been feeling good and everyone back at the factory worked so hard to bring the upgrade, so I was hopeful that we were going to be much closer than we are.”

On the prospect of fighting Sainz and Verstappen for victory, Hamilton feels that Mercedes’ aim has to be to keep pace due to Ferrari and Red Bull’s superior “baseline pace” but has vowed to push hard to spring a surprise.

Russell meanwhile endured a difficult “off the pace” FP3 in which he finished seventh and 1.239 seconds off the pace, although he was able to recover 0.607s by the end of Q3 as he finished 0.632s slower than Sainz’s pole time in sixth position.

The 24 year-old Brit though took heart from their smaller gap to the pole time here which often has not been the case this season, as he pointed to updates “working” effectively which he believes will benefit him in the race.

On how he expects his race to unfold, Russell commented: “It will be a race of high tyre degradation and a lot of different strategic options in play, and I think the race will be won and lost in the choices we make – we will need to be dynamic in how we react.

“Ferrari looked strong yesterday and I think we looked reasonable to them and Red Bull on the long runs, so I’m looking forward to seeing what we can do from the second row.”