Hamilton disappointed after ‘messy’ qualifying

Having led the opening part of the sole one-hour practice session, Lewis Hamilton ended up sixth fastest in the spring qualifying which left the Briton disappointed.

The seven-time world champion used exclusively the hard tyres in the practice session, working first on the setup of his car before performing an unusually long race simulation run.

With his hard-tyre run having been enough to take P5 in practice, Hamilton had expected to qualify himself high up the grid for the 100km Spielberg Sprint.

Speaking of his day behind the wheel of his W15, Hamilton said: "I had a difficult Sprint Qualifying today. Practice went well and the car felt good.

"I don’t think we had the pace to fight for pole position for the Sprint but we likely had more speed than we showed. I wasn’t happy with any of my laps and Sprint Qualifying was quite a messy session overall.

"The Sprint race tomorrow will be challenging. It’s not easy to overtake around here and starting P6 makes it difficult for us. If it’s not an eventful race, then I don’t think we will be able to move forward too many places. Nevertheless, we will still be giving it our all. Our main focus though is of course on Qualifying later in the afternoon and Sunday’s race," the Briton concluded.

His team-mate George Russell felt he got the most out of his car in the final segment of sprint qualifying, but he only ended up fourth quickest behind Max Verstappen and the McLarens of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri.

"The Soft tyre felt very good, and my lap felt strong. I was therefore a little surprised at the gap to P1, but I likely pushed too hard on the out lap. That potentially took a little of the peak grip away from the tyre. From in the car, it felt like the best lap of the session, so that is probably the explanation for why we dropped a little bit further back.

"P4 is still a decent place to be starting for the Sprint tomorrow. We are in the fight for the podium. Our focus is of course on Qualifying and the Grand Prix, but this is just another validation that we are on the right track and in the mix near the front," noted Russell.

"We had a solid FP1. Both cars managed a good amount of long run work, and, on the Hard tyre, we were looking similar to Barcelona in terms of competitiveness. Sprint Qualifying was quite straightforward although in SQ3 we were first out on track. It was important not to risk missing the flag but that does make it difficult to get the benefit of the track evolution.

"We hoped for a bit better than P4 and P6 but our performance on the Soft compound wasn't strong enough to challenge for better. Lewis picked up some floor damage and wasn't happy with his laps. George felt that he needed to a bit more high-speed grip to go faster, so we are looking at how to make a few improvements overnight.

"Our aim is to score decent points in the Sprint tomorrow morning, but it's also useful as long run preparation ahead of Sunday's race. We've also got the opportunity to tweak the car for main Qualifying after the Sprint. We know where we need to improve so hopefully, we can make a bit of ground up and start a little closer to the front for the race on Sunday," noted Shovlin.