“We did an okay job”: Lewis Hamilton reflects on qualifying session for Hungarian GP

Lewis Hamilton expected more from the Mercedes F1 team at the recently concluded Hungarian GP qualifying. The Mercedes ace qualified in P5 on Saturday, behind Ferrari's Carlos Sainz and ahead of Charles Leclerc.

Speaking about his qualifying performance, Hamilton said in the post-qualifying interview:

"We can only be satisfied. We did an okay job. We got the car in a decent place. When it's hot then we tend to struggle. When it was cold we were rapid, when it got warmer. The others were stronger."

Fresh from his victory at Silverstone in the 2024 British Grand Prix, Hamilton arrived with ample confidence at Hungaroring. However, his confidence received a dent after he failed to qualify in the front row, as McLaren snatched it for the first time since Hamilton's pole here at this track in 2012.

After Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, Max Verstappen and Sainz took the second row, and then came Lewis Hamilton. The seven-time world champion clocked 1:15.854 on the timesheet and was 0.112 seconds slower than Norris, the pole-sitter.

Hamilton's teammate George Russell, however, had a day to forget at Budapest. The Mercedes driver failed to clear Q1 and qualified in P17 for Sunday's race, behind Red Bull's Sergio Perez. Russell was a tenth slower than Kevin Magnussen, who made it through to Q2.

Saturday's outcome put Mercedes on the back foot as their Constructor's Championship charge faced a major blow. Their immediate rivals McLaren and Ferrari had a decent outing with P1, P2 and P4, P6 in the qualifying.

Compared to them, the Silver Arrows' P5 and P17 are unlikely to give them a major push with points on Sunday. Toto Wolff's team would need to find pace on Sunday to get points out of Russell's car.

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Mercedes engineer reflected on Lewis Hamilton's poor qualifying performances

5th-placed qualifier Lewis Hamilton of Great Britain and Mercedes climbs from his car in parc ferme during qualifying ahead of the F1 Grand Prix of Hungary at Hungaroring on July 20, 2024, in Budapest, Hungary. (Photo by Rudy Carezzevoli/Getty Images)

The Mercedes trackside engineering director, Andrew Shovlin, recently discussed Lewis Hamilton's underwhelming performance in the post-2022 qualifying. Shovlin mentioned that the seven-time world champion has struggled with the downforce of this new generation of cars.

"He’s struggled with this whole generation of car, really, not suiting his style. He’s been working on how he drives," Shovlin said. “It’s particularly [that] he struggled on the single lap. It’s more just the way that he wants to attack a corner when you do that, then the car would snap to oversteer. You start to build tire temperature.”

"So most of our work has been trying to give him a car that you can drive the very attacking style, extract the lap time out of it without it just sort of breaking away on the way in and catching him by surprise,” he added.

With 110 points, Lewis Hamilton is currently P8 in the Driver's Championship after 12 races. Compared to him, his teammate George Russell is in P7 with 111 points.

Mercedes is in P4 in the Constructors' Championship with 221 points. Red Bull, Ferrari and McLaren form the top three with 373, 302, and 295 points, respectively.