Hamilton takes pole at Silverstone

Jul 5, 2015
5 min read

Silverstone, the home of motorsport is always one of the highlights on the calendar. The first weekend of July can bring any sort of weather, and boy have we seen it in the middle of the English countryside. We have seen many a wet day for the British Grand Prix, but after a mini heat wave in the UK, Saturday for qualifying however would set place under very clear skies, ideal conditions for qualifying.

A leak in the hybrid system for Fernando Alonso before qualifying caused a question mark over his participation in qualifying, but the team sent him out anyway. Lewis Hamilton went out early on a set of the hard tyres, on what has become a blustery afternoon. It was Roberto Merhi who set the first flying lap, before being beaten by his team mate Will Stevens. Lewis Hamilton immediately went faster on a 1:34.9, with Bottas going second in the Williams just four tenths down on the Mercedes. Rosberg set a faster first lap than Hamilton, by just over three tenths of a second.

Max Verstappen had a spin into the Village complex on his first lap, with Massa slotting into forth place, with a Mercedes 1-2, Williams 3-4 early in the session. Fernando Alonso did a lap, before coming back into the pits. Raikkonen on his first lap went forth, on a similar pace to the Williams. Verstappen after his spin went 8th, with Sainz in 6th in the Toro Rosso. Vettel had his time deleted after going wide at Copse on his first lap.

After coming in the pits, Alonso went out on the medium tyre to go in 10th place, 1.8 seconds off the leading Mercedes pace. Verstappen had his time deleted, also running wide in Copse, with the Dutchman in the pits with 7 minutes remaining. Button was also out there on the Medium tyre to go 15th, and right on the bubble, and just ahead of Felipe Nasr in the Sauber. Romain Grosjean only went out on his first run with six minutes remaining, with his team mate Maldonado in 13th. Having got his first lap on the board, Vettel was only slightly slower than his team mate Raikkonen, splitting the Williams drivers. Perez and Hulkenberg had also times deleted for going over the track limits.

Maldonado went over the track limits while setting his fastest time, he was advised by the team that he would be doing another lap. Meanwhile Hulkenberg went 8th, and Grosjean 10th after setting their times late. Kvyat also went off at Copse and backed off his lap, although he had jumped up to 5th, before dropping down the order. Perez in the Force India went 4th, just behind Bottas.

With the chequered flag falling, at the bottom of the order it was Maldonado who would get himself of the bottom 5. Alonso also went 15th, before being beaten by Nasr. Raikkonen went fastest in the Ferrari, while Ericsson went 11th with all four wheel over the line at the final corner. Alonso and Button the slowest of the midfield teams again, with Vettel going 3rd on the medium tyres.

Nasr, Alonso, Button, Stevens and Merhi were dropped out at the end of the first part of qualifying.

It was a slow start to the second session, with none of the cars coming out in the first 90 seconds. It was Valtteri Bottas who went out first, followed by his team mate Felipe Massa, both on the medium tyre. The Finn did a 1:33.2 on his first lap, while Massa went wide in the first corner. Lewis Hamilton locked his brakes into Village, backing out very quickly with it likely that it would be his race set of tyres. Hulkenberg went four tenths of a second slower than Bottas. Massa on his second lap went third.

Ericsson went wide at Copse. Rosberg went fastest by half a second from Bottas in second. Ricciardo went 4th on his first lap, who was quickly beaten by his team mate, with Sainz in 7th and Verstappen down in 10th, who was still complaining of a lack of traction in the Toro Rosso. Hamilton went fastest on a 1:33.0, which he did another lap on the set of tyres. Ferrari had still yet to set a lap, with Raikkonen going 8th with his first lap, and Vettel 4th, knocking Raikkonen down to 9th. Not only that, but his time was deleted for running wide at Copse.

Coming down to the final two minutes of the session, Raikkonen had still to set a lap time. Williams were once again going early, with Massa doing another hot lap before the end of the 15 minutes. Massa went 6th fastest on his run, with Raikkonen not making a mistake on his second lap for 8th. Ricciardo went 7th fastest, with Kimi going down to 9th. Bottas went faster again to 2nd in the Williams. Hulkenberg, Ericsson and Perez didn’t improve, neither Maldonado. Sainz went 10th fastest in the Toro Rosso, with his team mate having a problem with the balance in his car.

Perez, Grosjean, Verstappen, Maldonado and Ericsson all went out in the second part of qualifying.

The final 12 minutes of qualifying once again started on the quiet side. A number of cars came out of the pits with 10 minutes remaining including Hamilton and Nico Hulkenberg, although the German had used three sets of the medium tyres. Ricciardo went fastest, before being demoted by Raikkonen and then Bottas. Hamilton went nearly a second faster than them also, with Rosberg behind him on the road. It wasn’t a great lap by the German, with him a tenth slower than Lewis. Massa, the last driver on the road went 4th. Bottas, Massa, Raikkonen and Vettel all separated by four tenths, with Kvyat and Sainz slightly further back.

Bottas went out ahead of Ricciardo and Hulkenberg for their second runs. Felipe Massa was once again at the end of the train in the second Williams. Rosberg went slightly faster than Hamilton in the first sector, with Hamilton not improving. Rosberg lost time in the middle sector. Massa went third ahead of Bottas in a switch at Williams. Sainz also went wide at the final corner and didn’t improve on his 8th place at Toro Rosso.

So once again at Silverstone, Lewis Hamilton takes pole from Nico Rosberg and Felipe Massa.

1 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1m32.248s –

2 Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1m32.361s 0.113s

3 Felipe Massa Williams/Mercedes 1m33.085s 0.837s

4 Valtteri Bottas Williams/Mercedes 1m33.149s 0.901s

5 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 1m33.379s 1.131s

6 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 1m33.547s 1.299s

7 Daniil Kvyat Red Bull/Renault 1m33.636s 1.388s

8 Carlos Sainz Toro Rosso/Renault 1m33.649s 1.401s

9 Nico Hulkenberg Force India/Mercedes 1m33.673s 1.425s

10 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull/Renault 1m33.943s 1.695s

11 Sergio Perez Force India/Mercedes 1m34.268s 2.020s