Austin: Lewis Hamilton’s hopes of clinching his sixth drivers’ world championship with a stylish American triumph were rocked when his Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas grabbed a surprise pole position at the United States Grand Prix.
Bottas, the only man who can delay Hamilton’s celebrations, kept alive his own faint and unlikely statistical hopes, by producing a stunning lap that broke Hamilton’s qualifying record at the Circuit of the Americas set last year. “I’m really happy about that — it was a nice lap,” said Bottas on Saturday. “To get those kind of laps on a track like this is a good feeling. “On my last lap, I was losing grip overall so I am glad nobody improved in the end on the second runs.” The Finn, who has to win the race and hope Hamilton finishes outside the top eight to keep the championship alive, clocked a best lap in one minute and 32.029 seconds to outpace second-placed Sebastian Vettel of Ferrari by 0.012 seconds. Max Verstappen was third for Red Bull ahead of Charles Leclerc in the second Ferrari and Hamilton, who was fifth. It was the champion-elect’s equal-worst qualifying on American soil, but he accepted he had nobody to blame but himself for failing to produce a complete lap at his best. “It’s nothing to do with the car. I just didn’t manage to put the laps together today and the car clearly had the capability to be on the front row,” he said. “It was just me, not the car, but I can still do it tomorrow. It was my fault and I will do all I can to rectify it .” He added. (AFP)
