“Anything could’ve happened” - Ferrari boss looks back on Lewis Hamilton’s qualifying at Suzuka

Fred Vasseur shared his views on Lewis Hamilton's struggles during the third qualifying session at Suzuka Circuit on Saturday. Ahead of Sunday's 2025 Japanese Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton and the rest of the F1 grid battled against each other for the grid position.

In the first two qualifying rounds, Hamilton put up lap times that were close to his teammate, Charles Leclerc. But the final round in the session ended up with the Briton qualifying four places behind his fellow Ferrari driver in the eighth position. The Italian team's principal, Fred Vasseur, suggested that the reason behind the difference could be attributed to any number of factors, including weather and car setups.

The Ferrari team boss, speaking after the qualifying round, highlighted that the management was yet to understand what happened in the third qualifying session, as Hamilton had the largest gap between his teammate when it came down to the Top 10 driver order being set. Vasseur said via FormulaPassion:

"I haven't spoken to him yet, we need to understand what happened to Lewis in Q3 because until Q2 he was fighting for a thousandth with Leclerc. Anything could have happened, a bad choice of settings in qualifying or the wind."

After the drivers completed Q1, Charles Leclerc was .022s faster than his British teammate. At the end of Q2, Hamilton was .055s behind Leclerc, and by Q3, the gap between the two drivers had significantly increased to 0.311s. The Monegasque driver will start the main race at the Suzuka Circuit in fourth place, and Lewis Hamilton in eighth.

So far, Hamilton and his teammate have started the race next to each other over the first two GPs of the season. At the season-opener in Australia, which was also the 40-year-old's debut race with Ferrari, Leclerc outqualified him to start the race in seventh, while the Briton started in eighth. The following weekend in China, the positions were reversed, with Hamilton starting fifth and his teammate starting sixth.

At the Sprint race in Shanghai, Lewis Hamilton secured a pole position and converted it to a dominant victory.

Lewis Hamilton promises to come back stronger for the race

Lewis Hamilton ahead of the F1 Grand Prix of Japan at Suzuka Circuit on April 05, 2025 - Source: Getty

For Sunday's Japanese Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton will be starting on the fourth row of the grid, in between Racing Bulls' Isack Hadjar and Williams' Alex Albon. Speaking about the performance of the car, Hamilton claimed that his position on the starting grid is not an accurate portrayal of what it is capable of, and explained that the team will be looking through the data of qualifying in an effort to put their best foot forward for the race. He said via Scuderia Ferrari:

"This result isn’t a true reflection of the car’s potential. There’s performance to be found and the team has been working incredibly hard behind the scenes. We’ll analyse the data overnight and do everything we can to come back stronger in the race."

The defending champion Max Verstappen took the pole for the Japanese Grand Prix ahead of McLaren's title contenders Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri.