Mercedes’ best result in qualifying for the French Grand Prix was Lewis Hamilton’s fourth fastest time. The seven-time world champion noted that Ferrari and Red Bull Racing have increased their lead this weekend, and he doesn’t know what that has to do with it.
Lewis’ teammate George Russell qualified sixth and is also concerned about the wider lead over the leaders.
Lewis Hamilton (4th): “I’m quite happy with my performance and the round in the final – nice attempt. But for some reason this weekend, like the rest, we are more behind the two leading teams – it looks like they are playing in their own league. I don’t know why the gap got so much bigger compared to the last leg.
By missing the first free practice I was in the role of catching up, but I am happy with the progress made. Everyone on the base worked hard with us. In the last practice we took a step back, but then we were able to correct everything. We keep fighting, the opponents are behind the problems, so we won’t give up.”
George Russell (6th): “I feel we were a bit further than expected, especially after Friday’s results. I had a good first run in the final and was in fourth place, but then I made a mistake on the last lap.
In fact, I’m more concerned about falling behind the leaders than about starting position. We have to understand why this is because we are the only team that usually close the gap with the leaders on Sunday.
Hopefully Lewis can fight Sergio Perez tomorrow, but Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen are probably too fast for us at the moment.”
Andrew Shovlin, chief race engineer: “Not the easiest qualifying. All day we have had problems with speed on a fast lap, but both drivers did a great job and qualified in the top six, although reaching the final was not easy.
We experimented with approaches to work with rubber in the pit lap, but it didn’t lead to an increase in speed. We don’t have an answer as to why the lead has increased so much, but at least we’re not losing that much in terms of starting positions.
I hope our race pace will be higher. Usually yes, but we didn’t do enough laps this Friday to be sure.
The tires will struggle in the race – the degradation of everything is higher than expected and the forecast promises that the track temperature will exceed +50C. This can create opportunities, but it’s hard to talk about expectations without knowing what the long-term pace will be. I hope we will be stronger than today.”
Source: F1 News
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