Hamilton takes pole; Paul to start on P5, Sutil P7

David Bodapati June 29, 2013

399 4 minutes read

Silverstone, 29 June 2013: Mercedes AMG Petronas’ Lewis Hamilton took pole position for the British Grand Prix with a stunning lap at Silverstone this afternoon to push his teammate Nico Rosberg to second place as Mercedes locked the front row again here on Saturday.

Meanwhile, Sahara Force India came up with a stunning show with Paul Di Resta taking the fifth place and Adrian Sutil starting on P 7 with Daniel Ricciardo in between. Red Bulls were right behind the leaders with Sebastian Vettel beating Mark Webber for P3. Romain Grosjean of Lotus was ahead of his teammate in P8 and Ferrari completed the top 10 with Fernando Alonso on P10.

Lewis achieved the team’s fifth pole position in six races and the 28th pole of his career today
Nico’s second place secured the team’s third front-row lockout in the past four races
Both drivers used three sets of option tyres in qualifying, saving new hard tyres fortomorrow’s race.

Quotes: Lewis Hamilton
It feels incredible to be on pole, just like it did back in 2007. We have the greatest Formula One fans in the world here in Britain and there was a great turnout today, which makes the atmosphere so special. My lap in Q3 was a lap for the fans out there around the circuit. I haven’t been feeling comfortable in the car all weekend, so I was really happy to find a good lap and this feels fantastic. The team has done a phenomenal job and it’s a great reward for the guys here at the track but also back at base, especially as our two factories are so close to the track. But we know that tomorrow is another day and our Sunday performance isn’t quite as strong right now. Our long run pace looked ok yesterday and we were able to manage the tyres quite well. It’s going to be tough to keep Seb behind but we will give it everything we’ve got.

Nico Rosberg
A fantastic team result today and it’s great to see how much progress we have made together since last year. The feeling of confidence that our car will be quick in qualifying is fantastic and I love going to a race knowing that we have a shot of a strong grid position. The team are doing a great job and we are keeping up the development so a big thank you to everyone at the factories, many of whom are here today watching. My lap was good and starting from the front row is great but Lewis did a fantastic job today. I hope we have improved our race pace; it will be all about tyre management tomorrow and keeping the others behind us. I’m confident that we can get a good result.

Ross Brawn
The team has worked incredibly well over the past few months to achieve a result like today’s. We have been chipping away at the performance, quietly bringing new updates and continuing to push, while also focusing our efforts on how we could improve our tyre management issues, and it seems to be paying off. The engineers and drivers got the cars into the perfect place for qualifying and, as the wind dropped towards the end of the session, both Lewis and Nico were able to deliver strong performances. Lewis put in a stunning lap at the end of the session and it’s great to see him and Nico pushing each other so hard in every session. It will be more of a challenge to remain as competitive in the race but we gathered good information yesterday and hope to be able to build on that tomorrow.

Toto Wolff
A fantastic result for the entire team to take our third front row lockout this year. Fair, sporting competition is what Mercedes stands for and, while a lot has been said and written this weekend, the only thing that really matters is what happens out on track. The focus this afternoon should be on our drivers, Lewis and Nico, and on this fantastic team who have pushed so hard to keep developing the car in tough times and solve our problems. Lewis put in a mega lap: I don’t know if it’s the Silverstone factor or something else, but that was an incredible performance. Nico has been strong all weekend and second position gives us a great platform for the race tomorrow. Tomorrow should be warmer and we have struggled with race pace at some circuits so far this year. But the trend is going in the right direction, and I hope we can continue that tomorrow.

Sahara Force India delivered a strong showing at its local track as Paul Di Resta qualified in fifth place for the British Grand Prix with Adrian Sutil in seventh.

P5 Paul Di Resta VJM06-04

Q1: 1:32.062

Q2: 1:31.291

Q3: 1:30.736

Paul: “I’m over the moon with the qualifying result and I think the whole team can feel very satisfied with fifth on the grid. The morning practice session was quite difficult so it feels great to come through and end up just behind two Mercedes and two Red Bulls. This track takes a lot of commitment and you need to build up your speed, but I think we saved our best till last – and that’s when it mattered. For tomorrow our tyre wear looks healthy and we’ve given ourselves a good opportunity to get in some clean air during the race. I will sleep well tonight and hope that we can have a straightforward race, and come away with lots of points.”

P7 Adrian Sutil VJM06-03

Q1: 1:32.002

Q2: 1:31.079

Q3: 1:30.908

Adrian: “Seventh place is a great result today. The car was not easy to drive this morning, but we made some improvements before qualifying and found more speed with each session. If we can do our homework tonight then we have the potential to have a great race. There are still some unknowns with the tyres over long runs because I haven’t really done more than ten laps on a set of tyres, but I feel comfortable on both compounds. So we can be happy with the result, but we need to concentrate on tomorrow because that’s what counts. In terms of strategy we need to keep an open mind and have several options going into the race so that we can react as the race develops.”

Vijay Mallya, Team Principal & Managing Director

“I am delighted with today’s qualifying result. The sun was shining, the grandstands were full, and we put on a fantastic show. Fifth place for Paul at his home Grand Prix is a tremendous effort, especially on this high-speed track, which has not been our strongest race in previous years. Adrian’s seventh place confirms just how competitive we are this weekend and we know that we have good race pace. For tomorrow it’s important that we maximise these starting positions and hopefully give our supporters and partners something to celebrate at our local race.”

ends