Hamilton keeps commanding British GP pole after investigation

Lewis Hamilton closed to within one of Michael Schumacher’s record for most pole positions after claiming the top spot by over half a second at the British Grand Prix.

The home favourite set an incredible 1:26.600s on his final effort and survived an investigation after possibly impeding Romain Grosjean during Q3 to match the record of five poles at Silverstone. Kimi Raikkonen claimed second after beating teammate Sebastian Vettel, who was unhappy with traffic at the start of his final run.

Valtteri Bottas finished fourth but will start ninth after the five-place grid penalty he received on Friday for changing his gearbox. The Finn matched what Hamilton did at the last race in Austria by opting to use the soft tyres in Q2 giving him a different strategy compared to the other top 10 drivers.

Bottas’ position will be inherited by Max Verstappen who now starts fourth but the bad luck at Red Bull this time hit team-mate Daniel Ricciardo, who was quickest initially in the damp conditions in Q1 but would suffer a turbo failure, causing him to pull off the track and will, therefore, start at the back of the grid.

That allowed Nico Hulkenberg up to fifth for Renault, as the German showed outstanding pace throughout the session. As expected the Force Indias moved up when the action got serious with Sergio Perez ahead of teammate Esteban Ocon in sixth and seventh.

Stoffel Vandoorne took his McLaren to a deserved eighth position, out-qualifying Fernando Alonso for the first time this year, then will come Bottas with Grosjean completing the top 10.

As track conditions improved during Q2, Jolyon Palmer was unfortunate to just miss out in 11th at his home race, he will be followed by the Toro Rosso of Daniil Kvyat in 12th.

Fernando Alonso finished the session 13th but will be forced to drop to the back of the grid with a 30-place penalty, that promotes Carlos Sainz, who had a suspension problem at the beginning of Q2.

Felipe Massa and Lance Stroll had a disappointing Saturday for the second straight weekend as problems optimising their upgrades persist. The Brazilian was 14th with the Canadian rookie struggling to 15th with little experience of an F1 car in the wet.

Another disappointment would be for Kevin Magnussen in 16th for Haas, as Pascal Wehrlein out-qualified teammate Marcus Ericsson to finish 17th and 18th respectively with Alonso and Ricciardo completing the grid for Sunday.

It would be interesting to see the comeback Bottas and Ricciardo will try to make during the race. With the top teams close on the long runs an exciting race is promised on Sunday.

Qualifying Result: